by Alastair Brydon
on 3 July 2013
Since I wrote my previous post on the capabilities of HSPA+, LTE and LTE-Advanced, SK Telecom has announced the world’s first end-to-end commercial implementation of LTE-Advanced. Other network operators, including Verizon, AT&T and NTT DoCoMo, have announced plans, trials and network implementations of LTE-Advanced, but SK Telecom is the first to offer a commercial service with mobile…
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by Alastair Brydon
on 30 May 2013
Last week I was interviewed for a forthcoming report on mobile network sharing and it prompted me to catch up on the latest 3GPP developments in this area. As network sharing becomes widespread in the mobile industry, a range of new capabilities are under development in 3GPP. These will provide network operators with much greater…
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by Alastair Brydon
on 29 October 2012
Earlier this month, Russian network operator Yota reported it had launched the world’s first commercial LTE-Advanced network, using equipment supplied by Huawei. The network comprises 13 base stations in Moscow and Yota has reported downlink data at up to 300Mbit/s. However, Yota has admitted that it will not have terminals available until 2013 and the…
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by Alastair Brydon
on 11 September 2012
Last month I welcomed the fact that Ofcom had expedited the introduction of 4G in the UK by allowing Everything Everywhere to launch LTE services in advance of the UK’s forthcoming auction of 4G spectrum. Today, Everything Everywhere revealed its 4G plans in more detail. Under its new brand of “EE” it will offer LTE services…
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by Mark Heath
on 21 June 2012
While the announcement has been some time coming, I’m delighted to see that the commercial realities of 4G LTE investment have caused O2 and Vodafone to make a very wise partnership decision. Vodafone and O2 have announced that they will pool their networks of radio masts and antennas, which will accelerate their roll-out of 4G…
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by Mark Heath
on 5 April 2012
There have been a number of interesting announcements in the last few weeks related to LTE. Firstly, NTT DoCoMo in Japan has announced that the number of subscribers to its LTE Xi service reached two million on 18 March 2012 – an increase of one million subscribers since 24 December 2011. This growth has been…
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by Alastair Brydon
on 27 February 2012
It doesn’t seem long ago that I remember looking across the Atlantic with pride as Europe forged ahead with the deployment of GSM systems, while the USA struggled to keep up with a disparate array of mobile network standards. Not anymore. Last week T-Mobile became the last of the four US national mobile operators to…
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by Mark Heath
on 19 January 2012
As we near the UK’s long-awaited auction of 800MHz and 2.6GHz spectrum for next-generation mobile services, there is very good news for UK consumers in terms of expected coverage of LTE services. Ofcom has published its latest proposals for the award of 800MHz and 2.6GHz spectrum, and it is clear that it has moved a…
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by Mark Heath
on 17 November 2011
Last month, the GSA highlighted accelerating deployments of LTE networks, and predicted that there will be at least 103 LTE networks commercially launched by the end of 2012. While LTE itself is still a new wireless technology, the pace of further developments has not slackened. In my last post, I reported that Sprint Nextel and…
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by Mark Heath
on 9 November 2011
Demonstrating that the USA continues to be a hot-bed of next-generation mobile activity, two further mobile network operators have announced plans to launch commercial LTE networks within months. US Cellular has announced that it plans to offer LTE services in the first quarter of 2012. Also, Leap Wireless has announced plans to launch an LTE…
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