Wireless service providers assess the year and look to the future

Cingular, Sprint talk about 3G successes, Verizon Wireless about its $2B deal with Nortel.

As the year draws to a close some of the country's largest wireless service providers spoke of their accomplishments in 2006 and are looking ahead to their goals for the New Year.

Cingular Wireless announced on Wednesday that its 3G network now reaches 160 markets, which was the company’s goal for 2006. Cingular’s 3G wireless technology is based on High-Speed Downlink Packet Access/Universal Mobile Telecommunications System more typically referred to as HSDPA/UMTS. The technology boosts download speeds of between 400Kbps and 700Kbps.

The wireless service provider says its 3G network now includes large cities including Chicago, Dallas, New York and San Francisco. Like other 3G wireless data services, customers can use Cingular’s HSDPA/UMTS offering to access their e-mail, the Internet or corporate office applications.

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As the year draws to a close some of the country's largest wireless service providers spoke of their accomplishments in 2006 and are looking ahead to their goals for the New Year.

Cingular Wireless announced on Wednesday that its 3G network now reaches 160 markets, which was the company’s goal for 2006. Cingular’s 3G wireless technology is based on High-Speed Downlink Packet Access/Universal Mobile Telecommunications System more typically referred to as HSDPA/UMTS. The technology boosts download speeds of between 400Kbps and 700Kbps.

The wireless service provider says its 3G network now includes large cities including Chicago, Dallas, New York and San Francisco. Like other 3G wireless data services, customers can use Cingular’s HSDPA/UMTS offering to access their e-mail, the Internet or corporate office applications.

While Cingular has made strides this year upgrading its network to 3G, it’s still behind its two rivals Sprint Nextel and Verizon Wireless.

Sprint announced Wednesday that it has put its $7 billion network investment to good work this year surpassing its 3G deployment goals.

The service provider says it is now offering its Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) Revision 0 service in 220 markets, 8,700 cities, across the country. The service can potentially reach as many as 188 million people.

In October the carrier started deploying next generation EV-DO Revision A technology by upgrading its network in 21 markets, which translates to potentially reaching as many as 67 million people. Sprint’s original goal was to reach 40 million by year-end. EV-DO Rev A supports upload speeds of between 300Kbps and 400Kbps and download speeds of between 450Kbps and 800Kbps.

EV-DO Rev 0 supports upload speeds of 50Kbps to 70Kbps and download speeds of 400Kbps to 700Kbps.

Sprint also announced earlier this year that it will start to deploy 4G wireless technology in 2007 with a national roll-out expected in 2008. Sprint’s 4G deployment will be based on WiMAX the IEEE 802.16e-2005 standard.

While Verizon Wireless didn’t announce its year-end accomplishments Wednesday, the service provider did announce a $2 billion five-year deal with Nortel Networks. Verizon will be using Nortel Code Division Multiple Access 2000 (CDMA2000)- based gear to upgrade its network.

The wireless service provider will be deploying new base stations, switching and optical network gear from Nortel.

Verizon also said that it is offering EV-DO Rev 0 services throughout the United States potentially reaching as many as 150 million customers. Despite requests, the carrier would not say exactly how many cities or markets it is currently offering EV-DO services.

Verizon Wireless, like Sprint, announced earlier this year that it would be rolling out EV-DO Rev A services. But Verizon has not revealed the cities or markets it is targeting for its initial Rev A upgrades.