Sprint previously planned to have their LTE network operational by 2012 and it looks like they are going to make good on those plans. Sprint announced yesterday that they are going to have their first set of towers up and running in Kankakee, Illinois. The towers are operational and some field testing has already been completed. The towers are first in the network that Sprint hopes will cover 250 million subscribers by 2013. They will eventually phase out their current WiMAX offerings but will still support it through 2015.
To make all this happen Sprint has partnered with
Light Squared to make LTE their primary network in the future.
Customers eager to get their hands on a Sprint powered LTE device will have to wait a little longer for one. The offerings will be nonexistent until the second half of 2012. Not great news but thats the way these roll-outs work. Rest assured the equipment will roll-out at a great time when Android handsets really start to boast some impressive specs. Quad Core anyone? This should make the wait more tolerable.
Source:
The Verge