“High likelihood” of LTE for Sprint

An executive at US carrier Sprint Nextel, which operates CDMA, iDEN and WiMAX networks, said this week that there is a “high likelihood that LTE will be in our future.” Geoff Martin, who oversees work at the carrier’s M2M Collaboration Centre on the outskirts of Silicon Valley made the comment during a press tour of the facility on Monday.

Sprint’s network technology strategy has long been the subject of speculation because of the incompatibility of its different platforms, something that has been brought into even sharper relief as the firm’s domestic competitors have begun their migration to LTE.

Sprint’s bet on WiMAX technology, which the firm markets as 4G, is looking increasingly isolated, while LTE now seems certain to be the closest the industry has got so far to a single global standard. The cost benefits of such a widely deployed standard, as well as the prospect of membership of such a large community of carriers, offer compelling justification for Sprint to switch horses, despite being in mid stream.

Martin also said that Sprint would be looking to make continued investment in its 1X RTT CDMA network, particularly for use in M2M applications.