Editor’s Note: Wireless operators are a busy bunch, and as such RCR Wireless News will attempt to gather some of the important announcements that may slip through the cracks from the world’s largest carriers in a weekly wrap-up. Enjoy!
—Verizon Wireless looks again to be pushing off the launch of its voice over LTE service, with its top executive noting during an analyst conference that the carrier is looking to unveil commercial VoLTE services later this year.
Speaking at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, Verizon Communications CEO Lowell McAdam said that there were still some issues to work out and that he expects the service to “begin to roll out later this year.”
“We have some handsets – I carry one now – that is in trial mode, and we are getting the kinks out of it,” McAdam said in response to a question regarding the launch of VoLTE.
Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said at an analyst conference last October that the carrier expected to begin rolling out VoLTE services during the first half of this year, noting that the carrier would need for its LTE network to match the coverage of its legacy 2G CDMA network that currently supports its voice service.
“We will not rush the VoLTE launch until we are sure that when you connect up a VoLTE voice call, it will be very, very similar to a 3G CDMA call, because that’s what our customers expect,” Shammo said. “They know what the CDMA footprint is. They know where they can call. … We have to make sure that our VoLTE experience is the same and that’s why we have taken such a long time and we believe that when we get to the first half of next year, the network will be ready, the experience will be very, very similar and that we will be ready to roll this out.”
Shammo’s statement followed one earlier in 2013 by Verizon CTO Tony Melone that claimed the carrier would have VoLTE “network-ready” by the end of 2013. A carrier representative explained in early 2012 that VoLTE services still had issues to work through, including consistent quality.
By moving voice traffic to its data-rich LTE network, Verizon Wireless will eventually be able to re-farm the 850 MHz spectrum currently supporting its 2G CDMA network to further bolster its LTE network. McAdam said that the carrier currently planned to begin re-farming 2G spectrum “into 2015 and beyond.”
–Speaking of Verizon Wireless’ network, the carrier swept each region in the latest J.D. Power and Associates consumer survey of wireless network quality. This was the second time in a row that Verizon Wireless came out on top across all the regions studied in a J.D. Power network quality survey.
The carrier handily beat its rivals across the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, North Central, Southwest and West regions in the survey. The survey was based on more than 25,000 responses during the second half of last year, with performance based on 10 problem areas that impact the customer experience: dropped calls; calls not connected; audio issues; failed/late voicemails; lost calls; text transmission failures; late text message notifications; Web connection errors; slow downloads; and e-mail connection errors.
AT&T Mobility was ranked second or tied for second across all six regions, with T-Mobile US managing to tie for second place in the West region. T-Mobile US was ranked third or tied for third across the Northeast, Southeast, North Central and Southwest, and finished fourth in the Mid-Atlantic region. Sprint managed a third place in the Mid-Atlantic region, tied for third place in the Southwest and was fourth across the Southeast, North Central and West regions.
The J.D. Power survey was the second round of good news this week for Verizon Wireless regarding network quality. Root Metrics reported yesterday that in nationwide testing, the carrier took the top honors in the overall, reliability, call, data and text categories. Verizon Wireless’ dominance in that category was only tripped up by AT&T Mobility scoring highest in the speed category. The report, which Root Metrics claims is its first nationwide test, included both drive testing and in-door testing resulting in more than 4.6 million data points across 50 states, was conducted during the second half of last year. The test broke down results into reliability, speed, call, data, text and overall. The call and text results were reliant on the operators’ 2G and 3G network, while the reliability, data, speed and overall results were from a combination of 2G, 3G and LTE services depending on availability.
–Mobile virtual network operator FreedomPop this week unveiled its Privacy Phone, which it claims enables encrypted communications and nicknamed the “Snowden Phone” in honor of Edward Snowden who has been releasing information regarding the United State’s intelligence gathering operations.
“In light of recent violations in consumer’s privacy across social networks and mobile devices, privacy is becoming increasingly important to many Americans and we all have a right to communicate anonymously,” explained Steven Sesar, COO at FreedomPop. “Large carriers don’t have the flexibility, desire or creativity to invest in privacy. We don’t agree with this approach and felt it was up to us to create a truly private mobile phone service at an affordable price.”
FreedomPop said the Privacy Phone taps into the company’s VoIP network to allow 128-bit encrypted communications for voice calls and text messages. The phone also sends application and Internet data through an encrypted virtual private network, and customers can request a number change at any time.
The device is built on top of the Samsung Galaxy S2 platform running Google’s Android operating system and retails for $189. The phone comes with three-months of unlimited voice, messaging and 500 megabytes of data transmission, which then ratchets up to $10 per month. To further its cloaking abilities, FreedomPop said it accepts Bitcoin as a payment option.
Additional carrier news can be found on the RCR Wireless News “Carriers” page.
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