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LTE Connected Car redefines the 'mobile' in mobile broadband (video)

by Vladislav Savov posted Nov 6th 2009 at 4:53AM

If you think cellphones have become overbearingly complex, look away now. A partnership of tech companies and content providers, known as the ng Connect Program, has revealed a prototype "LTE Connected Car," which, as you might surmise, combines 4G mobile broadband connectivity with a bunch of cloud-sourced facilities, such as video on demand, audio libraries, and multiplayer gaming. It can also serve as a Wi-Fi hotspot, connect directly to home automation or monitoring systems, and probably cook you scrambled eggs if you ask nicely. A Toyota Prius serves as the guinea pig for this new concept, and we've got video of the whole shebang after the break.

Read - ng Connect Program Puts Connectivity in the Fast Lane with the LTE Connected Car Concept Vehicle
Read - ng Connect Program Reveals the Long Term Evolution (LTE) Connected Car

Continue reading LTE Connected Car redefines the 'mobile' in mobile broadband (video)

Coalition of carriers, manufacturers settles on voice standard for LTE

by Chris Ziegler posted Nov 4th 2009 at 11:41AM

As much fanfare and support as it's been getting over the past couple years, LTE's dirty little secret is that there's been no unified stance on how to ferry voice services over the technology; the concentration has been on data alone so far. Sure, the occasional carrier has raised concerns -- and a variety of solutions have been proposed, ranging from VoIP to repurposing legacy networks for voice alone -- but until now, voice has been an afterthought that everyone's been procrastinating on solving. Fortunately, a veritable who's-who of industry players from both the manufacturer and carrier sides of the fence have congealed this week to announce the One Voice initiative, which basically just hand-picks existing 3GPP-defined standards for voice and SMS services over LTE. Strangely missing is T-Mobile, one of the loudest voices in demanding a voice standard for LTE up until this point -- but considering that AT&T, Orange, Telefonica, TeliaSonera, Verizon, and Vodafone are all on board along with Samsung, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, and others, we think they'll have no option but to fall in line in the long term. For consumers, this means we can all breathe a sigh of relief that LTE handsets won't be arbitrarily compartmentalized by supported voice standard, so it's a big win any way you slice it.

FCC keen on commandeering TV spectrum for wireless broadband

by Vladislav Savov posted Oct 28th 2009 at 7:12AM

We'll come right out and say it, we like Julius Genachowski. Whether you agree with the dude's policies or not, you can't deny he's pursuing them with gusto. Having already noted the insufficient carrying capacity of current mobile broadband airways to deal with incoming 4G connections, the FCC chairman is now reported to be moving ahead with plans to provide greater spectrum allocation for those purposes. Currently in the draft stage, the latest Commission proposals include a plan to reclaim airwaves from digital broadcasters (and pay them appropriately for it), which are to then be sold off to the highest bidder from among the wireless service providers. Executing the most extreme version of this plan could generate around $62 billion in auction revenues, though it would require transitioning digital TV viewers over to cable or subscription services and is therefore unlikely. Jules and his crew are still "looking at everything" and ruling out nothing, but we can probably expect to see a moderate shift of TV spectrum rights over to wireless carriers in the final plans when they're revealed in February.

[Via Phone Scoop]

Samsung and TeliaSonera bringing LTE to vikings in 2010

by Vladislav Savov posted Oct 22nd 2009 at 9:06AM

Scandinavian folks tend to be a pretty cheerful bunch during the summer, and now Swedes and Norwegians will have reason to smile through the cold dark winters as well, with Samsung announcing an agreement to provide TeliaSonera with "mobile broadband devices for commercial service next year." This agreement relates to Sammy's Kalmia 4G USB modem and adds to the Swedish operator's LTE push, which already counts Ericsson and Huawei among the contracted hardware providers. So that's 100Mbps mobile broadband, coming to a snow-covered nation near you within the next dozen months or so. All we would ask of our viking friends now is that they remember their world-conquering ways of the past and start spreading that goodness globally. Come on, it's our right! Full press release after the break.

Continue reading Samsung and TeliaSonera bringing LTE to vikings in 2010

Deutsche Telekom CFO on T-Mobile USA: 'we lost customers because many... couldn't get 3G'

by Chris Ziegler posted Oct 12th 2009 at 11:58PM

Sometimes, properly taking your lumps is the best way to learn a lesson and move forward, and Deutsche Telekom -- T-Mobile USA's corporate parent -- isn't pulling any punches about the mess it's gotten itself into in recent years. CFO Timotheus Hoettges has gone on the record in Germany this week saying that there's "no question that [they] lost customers because many of [their] customers couldn't get 3G," a painful acknowledgment that T-Mobile's old attitude toward high-speed data -- rely on EDGE supplemented by an extensive WiFi hotspot network -- as its larger competitors built out large swaths of genuine 3G coverage has ultimately hit the company in the pocketbook. For what it's worth, they seem to be making up for lost ground with a mega-rapid HSPA+ rollout (which Hoettges says will command some €3.5 billion -- about $5.2 billion -- of DT's investment cash this year), and there's still this whole Project Dark mystery to occupy our collective imagination, so the depth of the company's commitment to its American subsidiary seems genuine. Interestingly, Hoettges went on to say that they still haven't decided on a 4G strategy with "all options" still on the table. Ultimately, "all options" is going to mean either WiMAX, LTE, or capitulation, so we'll just have to sit back and wait to see how this develops.

[Via mocoNews]

FCC says there's a 'looming spectrum crisis'

by Chris Ziegler posted Oct 7th 2009 at 1:00PM

"What happens when every wireless user has an iPhone, a Palm Pre, or a BlackBerry Tour?" Speaking at CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment in San Diego today, FCC head Julius Genachowski has said that he wants to "close the spectrum gap" -- the difference between the spectrum it's making available for wireless data versus enormous usage projections (400 petabytes a month by 2013, he says) that'll be brought about by smarter, easier-to-use devices and ubiquitous high-speed data through a handful of initiatives including the promotion of the smart use of existing spectrum through the use of femotcells, WiFi, and smart antennas, and -- more importantly -- reallocation of existing spectrum. Genachowski says there are "no easy pickings" for reallocation, but the Commission is aggressively pursuing additional airspace that can help keep 4G rollouts on track. He's gone on to say that they'll be adopting the widely-discussed "shot clock" policy for placement of new towers, giving locales a limited window to protest placement of cell sites that'll help spread 4G services over wider footprints. The guy seems genuinely concerned about keeping 4G rollouts rolling, so let's see just how far the guys in Washington are willing to go to do that.

LG gets mysterious AWS LTE device through FCC

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 28th 2009 at 5:51PM

If this strange, rather unhelpful FCC label diagram looks vaguely familiar, that'd be because it's in the same product family as another LTE-compatible device submitted by LG to the FCC not long ago: the M13 with EV-DO compatibility. In fact, we'd venture to guess that this newly-passed M4 is basically the same thing as the M13, merely swapping 700MHz LTE and EV-DO for AWS LTE alone, which is the spectrum range that MetroPCS -- which has aggressively committed to rolling out LTE as soon as next year -- will need. LG's been meticulous about making sure it doesn't say anything specific enough in the FCC documentation to let us lay folk nail down exactly what it is, but there are brief mentions of connectivity via USB, so it's conceivable were looking at some sort of data modem here. Either that, or... you know, it's a piece of base station or test equipment that we'll never even come close to seeing in the flesh.

Verizon: LTE rollout to be 'as close to all-at-once as possible'

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 25th 2009 at 3:01PM

Historically, wireless rollouts have been miserably long, protracted affairs that take countless years to complete, but Verizon's talking in some really aggressive terms as it moves to LTE. The company wants to be at or near 100 percent overlay with its legacy CDMA footprint by 2013, but a ton of major markets will be covered and commercially well before then -- up to 30 in 2010. Speaking in an interview this week, Verizon Wireless CTO Tony Melone has reiterated that the company is still on track with its LTE deployment -- music to our ears -- and that they're not looking to "tease" customers at length with trial deployments that would require moving cross-country to enjoy. They're looking to establish a "significant footprint" out of the gate, which is allegedly made possibly in part by the LTE equipment's ability to share some infrastructure (backhaul equipment, for instance) with the CDMA network it'll be joining in cell sites around the country. Now, how about those USB LTE modems, Verizon?

China Mobile, Nokia Siemens team up to show first TD-LTE femtocell

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 21st 2009 at 4:54PM

LTE's being designed to support deployment in both frequency division (FD-LTE) and time division (TD-LTE) modes depending on bandwidth allocation and the legacy network that's being upgraded, and in China Mobile's case, they're looking at possibly rolling out a mix -- TD-LTE makes for an elegant and inexpensive upgrade path when you're starting with another tech with "TD" in its name, TD-SCDMA. Carriers around the world are looking to lean heavily on femtocells to boost LTE footprint out of the gate, and to that end, China Mobile has teamed up with Nokia Siemens -- a company that's been pushing a number of "world's firsts" lately -- to show off the first functional TD-LTE femtocell demo by streaming video over a base station in the carrier's labs. It's still a ways off yet before customers will actually have these tucked away in the corners of their homes, but it's a step in the right direction.

Nokia Siemens dials up first 'commercial' LTE call

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 17th 2009 at 5:20PM

Look, EDGE Evolution trials are pretty cool, but we all know that's not where the action's really at -- the people want to know what's up with LTE, and by golly, Nokia Siemens' gonna tell 'em. The infrastructure-focused joint venture has recently completed what it's billing as the first LTE call on commercial software using base stations fully compliant with 3GPP Release 8's LTE specifications, which means that trial and commercial 4G deployments toward the end of this year into next should have an easier time going live. Sadly, no details were available on the nature of the call or the end-user equipment being used, but we suspect the term "call" is being used loosely here -- in all likelihood, it was pure data using modems that you'll never buy.

Clearwire says it's not married to WiMAX for 4G, would be easy to switch

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 16th 2009 at 6:33PM

Save possibly for Sprint, no one's pushing WiMAX harder in the US than Clearwire -- but the commitment doesn't run as deep as you might think. Investing billions in a 4G network that goes brashly against the popular LTE grain is a huge gamble since Clearwire and its partners won't be able to throw as much weight around with manufacturers or achieve the same economies of scale that LTE carriers will, but these guys were smart: CEO Bill Morrow claims that the company has unprecedented flexibility built into its infrastructure, and he's willing to switch gears if LTE or something else ends up burying WiMAX down the road. Boasting that "we're the only carrier that can do this," Morrow says that a move to LTE would be a simple software upgrade for much of its equipment, meaning Clearwire could almost literally change technologies overnight and with minimum expense -- we're sure it'd still put a strain on the bank, but it theoretically wouldn't be as ambitious as changing from CDMA 1X to GSM, for example. Of course, the company's still got all its eggs in one basket for the moment with a clear commitment to WiMAX -- but from a shareholder perspective, it's at least good to know that it's easy to move the eggs.

MetroPCS commits to offering dual-mode LTE handset from Samsung next year

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 15th 2009 at 1:48PM

LTE's not just a big boy's game, it turns out -- regional carrier MetroPCS has been tooting the 4G horn for the better part of the year, too, and they're starting to detail how they plan for it to go down. On the back end, Ericsson equipment will oversee the operation, while the company's inaugural LTE phone will come courtesy of Samsung (why are we not surprised?) in a dual-mode configuration with support for both CDMA and LTE on board. That makes good sense considering that MetroPCS' (and Verizon's) LTE footprint will be a mere drop in the bucket compared to its CDMA one for the foreseeable future -- but what's surprising is that they expect to have it ready in "late 2010." That's incredibly aggressive for an LTE phone since Verizon (and most manufacturers) are making no secret of the fact that modems are the initial focus, not phones, a philosophy further evidenced by the fact that an LTE voice standard still hasn't been established. It'll be really interesting to see what form the phone takes and how voice will be handled -- there's a proposal for routing voice over legacy CDMA on the table, so it's definitely a possibility here, especially considering the phone will have CDMA on board anyway.

[Via Phone Scoop]

Update: MetroPCS has told Phone Scoop that it plans on rocking VoIP via LTE rather than using its existing CDMA infrastructure for voice, which is a pretty interesting play -- let's just hope they settle on a standard rather than trying to roll their own tech.

AT&T slinging HSPA 7.2 to six cities this year, adding backhaul capacity too

by Darren Murph posted Sep 9th 2009 at 8:44AM

If there's one thing AT&T's network could use, it's more network. Particularly in major cities (we're looking at you and your dastardly street parking situation, San Francisco), AT&T's 3G network is perpetually overwhelmed, oftentimes forcing users to switch to EDGE just to tweet about how awful the coverage is. Thankfully, the operator is making good on its earlier promise to roll out HSPA 7.2Mbps to select cities, with Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles and Miami now destined to get lit this year. Potentially more interesting, however, is the deployment of "additional backhaul capacity to cell sites," which will also support LTE when the time comes. All told, around 2,000 new cell sites should be added before the year's end, and at least a half dozen 7.2Mbps-capable smartphones should be in AT&T's portfolio by the same deadline. Feel free to express your joy in comments below -- that is, if you can get comments to load on your existing 3G connection.

Nokia's RD-3 modem boldly boasts LTE, and no, you can't have one

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 7th 2009 at 5:13PM

Nokia makes out its just-announced RD-3 data modem to be the dream of every road warrior: global GSM / EDGE, global HSPA, global LTE -- a twenty-plus year heritage of technologies in the GSM family tree compressed into a single device, powerful enough to get you service from a dusty GPRS cell site in some of the world's harshest landscapes or Verizon's LTE trials in Boston and Seattle just the same. The only problem is that you can't have it. The RD-3 is instead being reserved for carriers and infrastructure firms building out LTE networks around the globe as they march toward commercial availability in 2010, at which point Nokia (and others) will presumably have newer, better modems available for us lay folk to enjoy. In the meanwhile, though, it's alright: go ahead and drool.

Samsung boasts of first commercial LTE modem for cellphones

by Darren Murph posted Sep 2nd 2009 at 2:29AM

We can't say that we're absolutely certain that Samsung's not fibbing a little with its latest claim, particularly since NXP rolled out a multi-mode LTE / HSPA / etc. cellular modem way back in June of last year. Whatever the case, we're just stoked to see yet another big player drinking the LTE Kool-Aid, with Sammy developing what it calls the "first LTE modem that complies with the latest standards of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP)." The modem, which is being labeled the Kalmia for now, supports download rates of up to 100Mbps and upload speeds around 50Mbps within the 20MHz frequency band. In other words, if your future handset is equipped with this chipset, you could theoretically stream four HD movies with no buffering. Now, if only Samsung would announce a new mobile to go along with this, we'd really have reason to carouse.