LOS ANGELES-AirTouch Cellular has turned on its complete Code Division Multiple Access network in Los Angeles, having overcome software problems in the Motorola Inc.-supplied system.
The company launched a small portion of the system in May, then only covering 3,500 square miles in northern Los Angeles and only offering service to selected customers.
AirTouch originally announced plans to launching the CDMA system in the city during the fall of 1995. Since the May 1996 launch was considered at least six months late, AirTouch quit making predictions for further rollout and has been quiet about its progress on the new technology.
The company said this month’s launch met its latest goal of launching 80 percent of that market by year’s end, and says it expects to launch the remaining 20 percent by second quarter 1997.
“We completed the final commercialization a few months early because customer reaction has been so positive, and the Motorola software problems which occurred early this year are behind us,” said Lee Cox, vice chairman of AirTouch Communications Inc. and chief executive officer of AirTouch Cellular.
“Having ubiquitous digital coverage puts us on course to move 10 to 15 percent of our peak minutes off our analog network by mid 1997,” Cox said.
AirTouch’s strategy is to migrate its high-use customers from the analog to the CDMA network.
And beginning in January, AirTouch customers can roam on the CDMA network of 360
