Today, Clearwire released some interesting news about it’s LTE upgrades expected for 2013. Clearwire had planned on having about 5,000 new LTE cell sites by mid 2013. As you may remember, Sprint now controls the majority of Clearwire again, this happened after Japanese carrier Softbank took majority control over Sprint.
Clearwire will be cutting it’s LTE rollout by 2,000 new sites, so they can better lineup with what Sprint is doing with their LTE rollout. Currently Sprint’s LTE network is only available in a handful of cities. Also the change is for devices as well. Starting in Q2 next year Sprint will start deploying data devices, and phones in Q3 that use the 2.5GHz frequency which both companies are currently deploying LTE on.
While it’s sad that Clearwire is already cutting their expectations, and it’s still 2012, it is understandable and must be done. While many Sprint customers are upset that they don’t have LTE yet, or even a good 3G connection and I’m included in that, we have to learn about patience. But with Clearwire and Softbank’s help, hopefully Sprint can roll out LTE a bit faster.
Source: FierceWireless