Court provides tiered shutdown schedule for Sprint WiMAX network
Sprint’s WiMAX network appears to finally have an expiration date as a Massachusetts state court handed down a phased shutdown schedule tied to the use of the network by nonprofit organizations.
The decision came as a part of an extension to a previously announced injunction requiring Sprint to maintain the WiMAX network in 80 markets until the nonprofit’s could migrate more than 300,000 customers to a different network. The latest decision will allow Sprint to shutdown 16 markets by Feb. 2, another 39 markets by Feb. 29, and the remaining 25 markets by March 31.
Sprint had originally planned on shutting down its WiMAX network last November, before a court ruled Sprint had to maintain the network for at least another 90 days in support of more than 300,000 customers still using the network to access the Internet. That decision was based on a lawsuit filed by firms Mobile Citizen and Mobile Beacon, which claim to provide affordable broadband service to 300,000 customers, including 429 schools, 61 libraries and 1,820 nonprofit organizations.
Mobile Beacon and Mobile Citizen claim to have migrated approximately 40% of its customers to Sprint’s LTE network. The two nonprofit firms are part of larger education groups leasing the 2.5 GHz spectrum assets to Sprint, which is being used to power the WiMAX network and portions of Sprint’s LTE network.
“This request is a positive step forward for everyone involved,” said Katherine Messier, founder and managing director of Mobile Beacon, in a statement. “We’ve made great strides in our effort to migrate our users to Sprint’s LTE network, but there’s still more work to do. … We’re not going to stop until we’ve given every last person the chance to make the switch to LTE.”
The legal tussle appears to be about the details of the agreement with Clearwire, which, depending on the party interpreting the details, states Mobile Beacon and Mobile Citizen will have access to unlimited and unthrottled data services. Clearwire had previously offered unlimited data access through its WiMAX-enabled mobile broadband devices, though with the caveat of potential speed throttling should a customer be deemed to be exceeding normal usage. Sprint does not currently offer unlimited data access for its LTE-based mobile broadband devices, and recently said it would begin to deprioritize smartphone customers on unlimited data plans should they exceed 23 gigabytes of usage per month and be connected to a congested cell tower.
Sprint announced in April 2014 plans to shut down the WiMAX operations by Nov. 6, 2015, and said it has been successful in working with most of the companies tapping into the network in migration plans to its LTE network. Sprint inherited full control over the WiMAX operations when it acquired the entire stake of Clearwire in 2013.
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