Editor’s Note: Wireless operators are a busy bunch, and as such RCR Wireless News will attempt to gather some of the important announcements that may slip through the cracks from the world’s largest carriers in a weekly wrap-up. Enjoy!
–Rural operators continue to load up on high-end devices as Bluegrass Cellular announced it had begun offering Motorola’s Moto X on Dec. 6. The made-in-the-Unites States device was unveiled by Motorola earlier this year, with distribution spreading across the domestic mobile space.
Motorola offered an unlocked version of the device on “Cyber Monday” resulting in consumer demand crashing the device makers website.
–Staying on the rural carrier beat, Shenandoah Telecommunications reportedly deployed Ciena’s packet networking, unified management and service level agreements portal solutions to support its expanding fiber-to-the-tower and mobile backhaul services.
Shenandoah, which operates across portions of Virginia, West Virgina, Maryland and Pennsylvania under the Shentel brand, recently completed its LTE network upgrade as part of network affiliate Sprint’s Network Vision program. The upgrades, which were installed with the help of network partner Alcatel-Lucent, included the replacement of all Shentel’s network equipment and antennas.
–Wireless carriers continue to flip the switch on LTE network deployments, with the Global mobile Suppliers Association reporting 244 commercial LTE networks across 92 countries were on the air as of early December. The report noted that 98 of those networks had been launched in 2013.
The report goes on to state that 499 operators in 143 countries are “investing” in LTE, including 448 “firm commitments’ to build LTE networks and 51 operators “engaged in various trials, studies, etc.” The GSA predicts 16 new LTE networks will be launched by the end of this year.
As for spectrum support, the GSA notes the 1.8 GHz band remains the dominate choice with 44% of LTE deployments using that band. The group explained that the 1.8 GHz band “is typically re-farmed from its original use for 2G/GSM, facilitated by technology-neutral licensing policies.” An example of this can be seen from U.K. regulator Ofcom, which last year announced it would allow carriers to use their 1.8 GHz spectrum bands for LTE services. Carrier EE has already begun to layer in 1.8 GHz support for its LTE services.
The 2.6 GHz spectrum band is No. 2 on the popularity list with 29% of commercial deployments tapping into that band, followed by the 800 MHz band (12%) and the 1.7/2.1 GHz band (8%).
–Speaking of the United Kingdom’s LTE market, 3UK announced it has commercially launched LTE services across portions of London, Birmingham Manchester and Reading. The carrier said that it plans to have coverage across 50 markets by the end of next year and cover 98% of potential customers by the end of 2015.
3UK, which is operated by Hutcheson, picked up 10 megahertz of spectrum in the 800 MHz band for $342 million during the recent United Kingdom spectrum auction. The carrier had previously picked up 30 megahertz of spectrum in the 1.8 GHz band from EE as part of that carrier’s agreement with Ofcom to launch LTE services.
No word on if the carrier is set to re-brand as “4UK.”
Additional carrier news can be found on the RCR Wireless News “Carriers” page.
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