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RedSpark

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    Network Vision/LTE - Washington DC Market

    in Markets

    Posted

    No kidding.  Service connected but didn't function in the stations last night or this morning.

     

    - Trip

     

    I really hope the four carriers can get their act together on this soon. It's a shame this has dragged on so long. Hopefully the DAS includes Band 41 for Sprint.

     

    The Current State

     

    The four carriers — Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, and AT&T — are in charge of the project to install wireless infrastructure inside Metro’s rail system. In response to multiple inquiries by WAMU 88.5, a spokeswoman for Verizon, which speaks on behalf of the carriers, provided only a brief statement.

     

    “It’s our understanding that WMATA testified that WMATA and the carriers were in conversation about moving the project forward, which is in fact the case,” said Verizon’s Melanie Ortel. Verizon declined requests to speak to company officials about the progress of the work and whether the Sept. 30 deadline will be met.

     

    Metro indicated no work presently is underway.

     

    vs.

     

    The History (For immediate release: February 27, 2009)

     

    Metro riders will be able to call home from any cell phone, access the Internet from any Web-enabled cell phone and eventually have Wi-Fi access in the rail system, under an agreement approved Thursday by Metro’s Board.

     

    Four major cell phone companies -- Verizon Wireless, Sprint Nextel, AT&T and T-Mobile -- will build a new wireless infrastructure in the underground rail system during the next four years. 

     

     

    The companies will design, build, operate, maintain and own a wireless network. The firms will also build a second wireless network, which Metro will own, operate and maintain for Metro’s own operational and public safety communications. Twenty of the busiest underground rail stations will have expanded cell phone service by the end of this year and the entire rail system will be equipped by 2012. 

     

    Riders can now receive cell phone service from multiple providers at above ground stations, but the current underground wireless network only supports Verizon customers and Sprint phones that roam onto the Verizon network. In 1993, Metro agreed to allow Bell Atlantic Mobile Systems, which later became Verizon Wireless, to build and own the current wireless network. In exchange, Verizon built a public safety radio communications system for Metro. Verizon also has been paying annual fees to Metro. Transit agency officials say the wireless network doesn’t support all carriers and current broadband services, such as streaming video. 

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    Some more big news today:

     

    Mayor Emanuel and Sprint Announce More Than 1,000 New Jobs and Investment of Nearly $150 Million to Chicago by the End of 2016

     

    CHICAGO (BUSINESS WIRE), September 01, 2015 - Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Sprint(NYSE:S) announced today an expansion of Sprint® for Chicago, which will add more than 750 new jobs to neighborhoods throughout Chicago and an expected investment of nearly $150 million by the end of 2016. Today’s announcement builds on the 300 new jobs that Mayor Emanuel and Sprint announced in March 2015 when launching the Sprint® for Chicago initiative, which is dedicated to improving customer service and simplifying the brand experience. In total, Sprint expects to add more than 1,000 new jobs in Chicago by the end of 2016.

     

     

    Sprint currently employs more than 800 employees and has more than 160 stores across Chicagoland. Today’s announcement not only doubles the company’s headcount but increases network spend from $45 million to nearly $150 million over the next two years in the city of Chicago and $250 million in Chicagoland.

     

    Chicago will be the first Sprint city upgraded to an even faster network with the deployment of LTE Advanced technologies.

     

    New cell sites will be located in neighborhoods throughout the city and include the areas around Rush University Medical Center, areas surrounding Garfield Park, and along Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) subway routes as part of the city’s project to upgrade the Chicago subway’s wireless network to 4G.

     

     

    And the Pope didn't even have to go!  :)

    • Like 4

    Network Vision/LTE - Washington DC Market

    in Markets

    Posted

    This info was tucked into the Preparing for Pope Francis Blog Post (By Scott Santi, Regional Vice President, Network).

     

    We’re pleased to report that our network performance across all markets, including Philadelphia, New York and Washington D.C., has been steadily improving.

     

    In Philadelphia, New York and D.C., we’ve added hundreds of new 2.5GHz cell sites, and expanded our 1.9GHz and 800MHz LTE coverage. Each cell site has then been systematically optimized to maximize throughput and provide the best customer experience. In addition, our local engineers have improved service and upgraded the wireless systems in many of the high-traffic public venues slated to be on the Pope’s agenda. 

     

    Travelers in D.C. will also notice better service at Reagan International Airport resulting from a recent upgrade.

     

    Yay!

    • Like 3

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    The Woman Behind Sprint's Chicago Shakeup

     

    Some good info in this article about Sprint's Chicago Market and Management Model Experiment.

     

    They were at Lollapooloza too. Here's a tidbit from a while back about local improvements:

     

     

    Sprint, the official wireless sponsor of Lollapalooza, will offer two pavilions with free Wi-Fi and recently made permanent capacity upgrades in Grant Park and the surrounding areas, said Yui Namiki, Sprint communications marketing manager for Chicago.  

     

    Both Sprint and T-Mobile say they have COWs ready to handle Lollapalooza traffic this weekend.

     

     

    Good tidbits in there about Marcelo's management style too!

     

    Thoughts?

    • Like 3

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    It's how it is. The other three run single mode operations which allow them to broadcast higher power settings compared to Sprint who runs dual mode on their RRUs and has the split the power between LTE and CDMA.

     

    How will things work when Sprint enables VoLTE? They'll still have to broadcast CDMA for some time right? When it's finally shut down, they can broadcast at higher settings?

    • Like 1

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    I hope...but not likely. All around me is like this. Jacksonville, FL. They're great downtown but suburbs really hurt.

    beee011103801cb7899fa1e5b714cd4b.jpg

    I do hope CA puts Sprint ahead in many markets with speed, though.

     

    Sent from my M8

     

    Get this man some B41 with 2x20 MHz CA Stat....

     

    Upon further review... CA would be only marginally helpful for your M8 because your device doesn't support it (It would however benefit from the network effect of other devices using CA) .... Is an M9 (which supports it) in your future?

    • Like 3

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    T-Mobile joins CCA's data roaming hub to expand reciprocal roaming deals with smaller carriers

     

     

    The hub was launched in March 2013 and Sprint joined in March 2014. T-Mobile has been part of the steering committee for the roaming hub but had not previously allowed CCA members to connect to its network via the hub. According to CCA, there are more than a dozen participating rural and regional carriers in the hub.

     

    .....
     

    Smaller carriers will now be able to access T-Mobile's LTE network for roaming through the hub and T-Mobile will be able to expand roaming partnerships and extend its footprint with members whose network technologies had previously been incompatible.

     

     

    Didn't see this coming...

    • Like 3

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    It's all apart of the Next Gen network plan which SoftBank is covering. Crazy how Marcelo didn't necessarily care about speeds but that's quickly changing

     

    Right. It sounds like something recently changed with what SoftBank was willing to cover.

     

    I think he cared about speeds, but not as much as making sure the people would be able to complete a phone call or send a text. Voice/Text complaints probably registered the highest on why people were leaving. Sprint has solid performance rankings on both now, so data is the next piece of the puzzle to solve.

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    Hmmmm... Happy to see Sprint trying things, but their old idea was a pretty good one in my opinion as long as their threshold was low on when to add B41. Nothing makes my cringe more than seeing B41 in the middle of nowhere. The reason I say this is because it costs money to deploy and to have that level of fiber available. For a company with a lot of debt, just doesn't make sense to deploy where you do not need it (example: markets with B25 ~12 mbps or greater).

     

    Seems like SoftBank is footing the bill on this somehow.

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    Extremely exciting. Really makes me want to buy an iPhone 6s just so I can experience CA but I'm going to wait until the iPhone 7 (2016 version). Devices next year will support 3x20 CA, and possibly TD/FDD LTE CA which I hope the iPhone 7 will have.

    Exciting times at Sprint, that's for sure. Hopefully Apple adopts this quickly enough for it to make it to the iPhone 7 feature set.

     

    Have you considered doing iPhone Forever?

    Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

    in General Topics

    Posted

    Sprint has B41 DAS in all of the stadiums/arenas they sponsor in KC. Sporting KC, Sprint Center, Kauffman and Arrowhead all have upgraded systems to provide excellent service. At last year's World Series, Sprint was the only one with truly functioning service thanks to 2 B41 carriers. Co-workers AT&T and Verizon devices frequently timed out or were extremely slow with data and texts. I had 20Mbps downloads in the 4th inning of game 6.

     

    Indeed they do, and it's made a real difference from what I've heard. They should also try to put a DAS in MCI as well, if there isn't one already there. They do come out ahead of AT&T for data! (Report)

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