14 DAY TRIAL // Mobile phone carrier Verizon Wireless seems set to make some changes to its offering for end-users, and the availability of a handful of 4G-capable handsets might be just the first step the company takes in this direction.
Last week, during the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vega, the wireless carrier announced officially the upcoming availability of a wide range of new devices that support its 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) network, and might come up with even more of them soon.
One of the latest entries spotted on the wireless carrier's website (here, though the page was already pulled) was called Palm Voice Test and Palm LTE Voice, and might point at newer devices and new offerings for Verizon's customers.
Of course, nothing was unveiled on this in an official manner, but various speculation on what could this all mean already started to emerge.
Some suggest that HP Palm and Verizon might be working together on the launch of a LTE-capable webOS smartphone, and the fact that Palm's name appears there, along with LTE mentioning and a photo of Palm's Pre Plus smartphone seem to confirm that.
Also, the page is said to actually hint at the near availability of voice calls over LTE, something that is not available at the moment.
New devices launched for Verizon would handle data calls on LTE, while voice calls would be made via 3G.
Verizon's CTO Tony Malone stated last week that integrated LTE voice + data would arrive only sometime next year, or in 2013, and the page in question is suggested to hint at testing conducted in this area.
Whether that would involve the near availability of a Palm smartphone with support for LTE, it remains to be seen.
Major handset vendors around the world already announced officially handsets that include LTE connectivity, or plans to come up with some of them, and HP Palm might join the party too in the near future, though we'll have to wait for a formal announcement to be made to learn more on this.
