According to inside sources, a network sharing agreement of Sprint Nextel with Lightsquared unified with its announcement of earnings is going to be announced on the 28th of July. The agreement, according to which the upcoming 4G Long Term Evolution network of Lightsquared will use Sprint’s network as its infrastructure backbone, will signal the strategy that Sprint intends to use for its own venture with 4G. It was expected that Sprint would announce any development on its plans for its new generation of network before the middle of the year; however it has postponed the announcement.
Even as Sprint arrived early on the 4G scene along with its partner Clearwire and 4G WiMax network, the company has recently been talking about establishing independent plans of its own. Sprint has already formed a plan called Network Vision, which is a very big overhaul of the company’s network and will allow it to utilize multiple technologies at the same time.
This potential shift in strategy from Sprint has come after its rival wireless providers have all revved up their services. By next week Verizon Wireless will have covered more than 100 markets with its services of 4G LTE. Similarly, T-Mobile and AT&T, too, have been expanding their wireless HSPA+ networks rapidly, which according to them can be faster than WiMax in some areas. In addition to this, AT&T has plans of launching its own LTE network over five markets this summer.
Clearwire and Sprint had bet on WiMax earlier than the competition, a strategy that paid off as Sprint achieved a large growth turnaround. However, financial issues have led to the stalling of Clearwire’s rollout of its network, and even after getting a head start it has covered only 71 markets.
As the wireless industry steadily moves towards LTE as a common standard, Sprint too has been planning to pursue that direction. Over the period of the next three to five years, the company plans to spend $4 billion to $5 billion over the upgrade, and it is expected that it will save more than $10-11 billion in the course of next seven years because of its more efficient equipment. It has been reported that work on the upgrade will begin in the second half of this year. The ability of Sprint to handle multiple technologies concerning wireless networks has also allowed it to offer its network infrastructure to companies like LightSquared.
