In the wake of Clearwire’s topsy turvy row and reconciliation with parent Sprint, the WiMAX operator is making some big changes. Last week, an SEC filing revealed that director Ben Wolff has resigned, making him the latest member of Clearwire’s original management team to depart. Today Clearwire revealed to DSLReports that it is simplifying its mobile broadband pricing structure, eliminating contract plans entirely and charging a simple prepaid flat rate of $50 a month for its WiMAX to all new customers. (more…)
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Kevin Fitchard
Senior Editor
Kevin Fitchard Wireless Infrastructure Editor, covering wireless infrastructure/IP services. Kevin is an acknowledged expert in all things wireless and has covered the industry for more than a decade for Connected Planet, Telephony and Wireless Review.
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Towerstream grows its California network with Color Broadband buy
Towerstream is about to get a lot bigger in Southern California. The metro wireless ISP is buying Color Broadband, a competing fixed wireless WiMAX provider in Los Angeles and Orange County. Towerstream didn’t disclose the financials of the deal, but operationally the acquisition gives the WISP much more visibility (both figuratively and literally) in one of its most important markets. (more…)
Femto Forum working on Wi-Fi offload–that’s right, the Femto Forum
The Femto Forum is quite the busy when it comes to standards, always trying to get its technologies incorporated into whatever release the 3GPP happens to working on. Its latest standardization work is somewhat bizarre for on organization dedicated to promulgating femto and small cell technology. The Forum is developing carrier Wi-Fi offload technologies. (more…)
2011 LTE goal reached, Verizon continues expansion
Verizon Wireless revealed in its earnings call on Friday (CP: Verizon’s mobile data growth still driven by Android, 3G) that it had already succeeded in completing it planned 2011 footprint, but VZW isn’t resting on its laurels for the remaining two months of the year. It said today it plans to build its LTE footprint well beyond its goal of 185 million pops covered—right now it’s 1 million over—and will continue to turn up new markets in November and December. (more…)
In-Stat: LTE growth will overtake EV-DO in 2012
In-Stat released its quarterly cellphone analysis today, projecting that global LTE subscriptions would grow to 290 million in 2015 while annual LTE handset shipments would surpass 154 million that same year. But the In-Stat’s most interesting datum had nothing to do LTE, but rather its 3G predecessor: the research group predicted that North American CDMA EV-DO subscriptions would peak as soon as next year before starting a long process of decline. (more…)
Looking for a new friend on Facebook? Try your mobile operator
Telecom operators’ networks have powered the rise of social media, but the operators themselves haven’t exactly been the most active contributors to it. Sure every carrier has a Twitter feed and Facebook profile, but they’re hardly in the same league as Lady Gaga. Nokia Siemens Networks, however, is hoping to get operators a little more involved in the digital social currents. (more…)
Can Motorola revive the RAZR’s glory?
The RAZR is back! And unlike the Motorola’s previous attempts to infuse further life into the enormously successful device (remember the KRZR?), Motorola isn’t settling for a knock off of its own design. Instead its starting from scratch in an attempt to make the Droid RAZR as cutting edge in 2011 as the RAZR was in 2001. (more…)
FCC gets tough with AT&T on merger job claims
The FCC is showing more signs that it’s not taking at face value AT&T’s claims about the supposedly public benefits of merging with T-Mobile. Today FCC Wireless Telecommunication Bureau Chief Rick Kaplan sent a letter to AT&T asking T-Mobile to explain its statements that acquiring T-Mobile would create more U.S. jobs. (more…)
LightSquared says GPS device overhaul will cost $400M, but who’s going to foot the bill?
LightSquared chief market officer Frank Boulben in an interview with CNET put a price tag on its proposed interference fix for high-precision GPS devices: $400 million to retrofit roughly 500,000 devices. LightSquared thinks it shouldn’t have to foot the bill either.
As precision GPS devices technically listen in on LightSquared’s spectrum, which is the primary source of their interference problems, LightSquared believes that GPS device makers should eat the cost of reining in their receivers. According to LightSquared, if the GPS industry has designed receivers more carefully years ago there wouldn’t be GPS interference issues with LightSquared’s proposed GPS network today (CP: Sorting out the LightSquared GPS interference mess). (more…)
CTIA: AT&T loads up on Android
SAN DIEGO–When Verzion Wireless got the iPhone, AT&T said it would no longer place all of its bets with the iconic Apple device and would look toward Google to fill out its smartphone portfolio (CP: AT&T jumps into the 4G wars with focus on new devices). Well, it turns out competition from Verizon did nothing to diminish the popularity of the iPhone among AT&T’s customers, but AT&T isn’t using that as an excuse to back away from its Android commitment. In fact, AT&T is doubling down on its Android bet, announcing five new handsets at CTIA Enterprise & Applications, including its second smartphone targeted at prepaid customers. (more…)