14 DAY TRIAL // The rush towards delivering better broadband speeds to mobile phone users in the US seems to have caught yet another wireless carrier, namely T-Mobile, which is reportedly gearing up to provide HSPA+ services to its subscribers all around the country by mid-2010. Moreover, the mobile phone operator seems to have already started the deployment of the 21Mbps network in Philadelphia.
According to a recent article on FierceWireless, Neville Ray, senior vice president of T-Mobile USA's engineering and operations, stated at the 4G World conference that the company planned on rolling out the HSPA+ services in the US next year, while also adding that some sections of the Philadelphia area already benefited from the deployment of the new network.
HSPA+ is “the most cost effective way for operators to move into the mobile broadband space very aggressively,” is what Neville Ray reportedly stated. At the same time, he also added that the technology could be easily rolled out on the existing network footprint, as it used the same spectrum and was compatible with the existing services.
In addition to announcing the upcoming network upgrades, Ray also stated that the company “will be an LTE house at some point in time, but it depends on how this path develops.” T-Mobile is just one of the carriers that will migrate to the upcoming 4G networks using LTE, the same as Verizon Wireless and MetroPCS, which already announced the deployment of the standard starting with the next year.
The North American continent will also see HSPA+ coverage coming from the Canadian wireless carrier Rogers, which already announced the commercial launch of its 21Mbps network in five majors cities in the country. At the same time, we should also note that T-Mobile's CTO, Cole Brodman, has stated recently that the company is working on upgrading its network to HSPA 7.2 and that the upgrade to the more advanced speeds will start next year.