An Ignoble Experiment

7. Google will launch an MVNO with a U.S. carrier
6. Comcast will launch a Wi-Fi-based wireless service
5. Google will replace the Nexus device program with Android Silver
4. Sprint will announce a merger with T-Mobile
3. Apple will introduce a wearable device or health-related services
2. Amazon will introduce a Kindle smartphone
1. Apple will release a larger iPhone

The wireless industry is often awash in rumors. Today, those rumors range from a possible merger between Sprint and T-Mobile to a possible iWatch from Apple.

But, with all the noise in the industry, it's often difficult to track the source and evolution of these rumors. More importantly, it's also difficult to evaluate the likelihood of these rumors becoming reality.

Thus, FierceWireless has taken a look back at the recent spate of rumors to assess the evidence and determine how likely it is that the rumor will turn into a reality. We'll also assign a "star ranking" for each one on a scale of 1 to 5. The more stars, the more likely it is that the rumor will come to pass.

As ever, we welcome your comments. Are there rumors we haven't covered that you think will pan out? Let us know!

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Today's Top News

1. AT&T exec: We'll be adding 1,500 to 3,000 cell sites per year for 'foreseeable future'

By Phil Goldstein

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2. Verizon plans nationwide VoLTE launch this year with 'robust' smartphone lineup, video calling

ORLANDO, Fla.--AT&T Mobility (NYSE: T) will likely be adding between 1,500 and 3,000 macro cell sites to its network per year for the next few years as part of a wide-ranging effort to beef up its network and improve coverage and capacity, according to a senior AT&T executive.

Smith

Bill Smith, president of AT&T network operations, said the carrier would be adding that many sites to its network per year "for the foreseeable future." That will likely happen in parallel with AT&T's deployment of new spectrum bands for LTE service, such as the 2.3 GHz WCS band or AWS-3 band, which the FCC will be auctioning later this year. However, the addition of new macro sites is just one element in AT&T's ongoing transformation of its wireless network, he said.

Speaking here in a keynote address at the PCIA wireless infrastructure conference, Smith said AT&T is also focusing on small cells and Dsitributed Antenna Systems as key elements of its network planning to improve inbuilding coverage and gain spectral efficiencies in cost-effective ways. AT&T has committed to deploying 40,000 small cells on its network by the end of 2015 and Smith said the carrier has already deployed both indoor and outdoor small cells in 30 states.

Smith also said AT&T is using tower-mounted radio heads to prevent power loss to its antennas, a move that also boosts signal strength.

Another element of AT&T's strategy is to embrace carrier aggregation, which bonds together disparate bands of spectrum to produce wider channels and faster speeds. Carrier aggregation is one technique enabled by LTE Advanced and Smith promised that ATT will divulge more of its LTE Advanced plans later this year. He said carrier aggregation is "probably one of the single most important" things AT&T can do to improve the performance of its wireless networks.

AT&T is also using self-optimizing network technology to improve network reliability and user speeds. Smith said that historically, it has taken around six to 12 months to optimize the network, whether that's via antenna realignment or other techniques. SON 2.0 techniques will give AT&T the capability to do things like dynamic interference management and change the tilt of antennas dynamically, he added.

Finally, AT&T is also moving ahead with its User-Defined Network Cloud initiative, which is based around using Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV). Smith said in its network today, AT&T has "dozens of special, purpose-built pieces of equipment that do a particular function. It doesn't have to be that way." By virtualizing hardware functions into software and running it on commodity hardware, AT&T can cut costs and make its network more flexible and adaptable, he said.

"We think that's going to provide a lot of cost savings for us going forward," Smith said. That does not mean AT&T will build fewer cell sites or deploy fewer small cells, but AT&T will get more efficiency out of its network, he said.

Read more about: SON, AT&T, SDN
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By Mike Dano

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3. Crown Castle CEO: AWS-3 auction to likely to spur 'thousands' of new cell sites

Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) reiterated its plans to launch VoLTE sometime this year, and said that when it launches the service the carrier will offer a "robust line" of VoLTE-capable smartphones and video calling services. Verizon's announcement likely is an effort to counter rival AT&T Mobility's (NYSE: T) own VoLTE launch, scheduled for Friday in a handful of markets on one phone.

"We believe the combination of this robust network along with the new features is going to create a new, meaningful experience for our customers for their calling needs," said Brian Higgins, VP of mobile and Internet services for Verizon's product group, in a conference call with reporters. Higgins added that Verizon will release additional details on its VoLTE service throughout this year and next year.

Higgins confirmed only that Verizon's VoLTE launch would happen sometime this year and he declined to provide a more specific time frame for the launch. He said that, when Verizon launches VoLTE, the service would be available nationwide--meaning, Verizon does not plan to roll out the service on a market-by-market basis. Higgins declined to name Verizon's VoLTE technology vendors.

Higgins said Verizon's VoLTE-powered HD Voice service would work over the AMR Wideband standard, which he said would allow the carrier to connect its service to similar services powered by other carriers. Higgins said this kind of interconnection will create the "scale and scope (that) is critical for this kind of service."

Higgins said Verizon's VoLTE service would be built in to a wide range of Verizon's phones, and that the carrier would add VoLTE service to additional, existing phones through a software update. He did not specify which exact phones would be capable of making VoLTE calls.

Higgins also said that HD Voice and video calling would be the two main services initially offered through VoLTE technology. He said the services would be accessible through a phone's native dialer. He said VoLTE calls would only be supported between two phones than can run the technology.

VoLTE technology represents a significant change in the way voice conversations are transmitted over the wireless network--conversations are transmitted via IP technology on LTE rather than via circuit-switched connections. However, Higgins declined to say whether Verizon would also move its text messaging services to an IP connection when it launches VoLTE.

AT&T last week announced it would launch VoLTE services this Friday via the Samsung Galaxy S4 mini in select areas in Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota and Wisconsin. The carrier said it will expand to additional markets and phones in the future. AT&T said the technology would power HD Voice functions but made no mention of video calling.

Both AT&T and Verizon are launching VoLTE after delays. Verizon Wireless in 2010 said the carrier would launch VoLTE by late 2012 or early 2013, but now the carrier expects to launch VoLTE sometime this year. And AT&T had said in 2010 the carrier hoped to launch VoLTE by the end of 2013, a target the carrier reiterated in 2013. But AT&T missed that launch window by five months.

AT&T and Verizon aren't alone in the HD Voice arena, though they are the only major carriers launching the service via VoLTE. Sprint (NYSE: S) introduced EVRC-NW HD Voice about two years ago on the HTC Evo 4G LTE smartphone. The carrier expects to offer nationwide HD Voice sometime in the middle of this year. T-Mobile US (NYSE:TMUS), for its part, turned up W-AMR HD Voice on HSPA in January 2013.

In announcing Verizon's VoLTE news, Higgins also provided a few minor updates on other areas of Verizon's network. He said the carrier will soon announce additional details of its LTE Broadcast technology launch, which Verizon has dubbed LTE Multicast. He also said that, as Verizon moves traffic onto its LTE network, the carrier is freeing space on its existing CDMA network and that it could start refarming its CDMA spectrum for LTE. However, he said that the carrier has not yet started doing that refarming yet, and provided no timeline for such work.

Read more about: AMR-Wideband, voice over LTE
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By Phil Goldstein

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4. Lenovo profit surges 29% in Q1, promises to sell 100M smartphones, tablets this year

ORLANDO, Fla.--AT&T Mobility (NYSE: T), Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) and other carriers are likely going to bid billions of dollars for AWS-3 spectrum in an FCC auction of those airwaves later this year. And as auction winners deploy networks over their spectrum during the next few years, that's going to translate into big business for tower companies, according to a tower executive.

In an interview with FierceWireless, Crown Castle CEO Ben Moreland said that he anticipates the auction will result in Tier 1 carriers deploying "several thousand" more cell sites in the years ahead. Initially he said, the AWS-3 deployments will likely inlcude additional equipment being added to existing towers and sites.

"I think it will certainly start with amendments" to existing sites, he said here at the PCIA wireless infrastructure conference. "But very quickly you'll find that by the time they get through that, they will have added probably several thousand more cell sites to their network than where we are today in mid-2014."

Moreland said that what Crown has seen historically is that as carriers have gained more spectrum, they usually add antennas "so they can maximize the spectral efficiency of what they have just acquired." While he said carriers certainly have the technical ability to combine frequencies into single-antenna arrays, "it typically has been sub-optimal, depending upon which frequency you are talking about."

Already carriers are adding to their existing deployments. Verizon is building out its AWS-1 spectrum, which now covers a little more than half of its LTE markets. And T-Mobile US (NYSE:TMUS) is adding more equipment as it refarms MetroPCS' AWS spectrum to create wider channels for its LTE network and move to 20x20 MHz deployments in major markets.

Moreland added that he thinks both of those projects are going to continue into 2015. He said Crown is currently seeing "a very significant" increase in site deployments where Sprint (NYSE: S), Verizon and AT&T are choosing to collocate their sites with those from other carriers. "They're adding across the entire industry several thousand new colocations," which Moreland said may be an effort to increase network density ahead of Voice over LTE launches.

Moreland said next year's planned incentive auction of 600 MHz broadcast TV spectrum could also result in more business. The FCC's rules for that auction are geared to ensure that smaller carriers get a slice of the spectrum, up 30 MHz in some markets. That is expected to fuel more rural LTE deployments.

The Crown Castle chief noted that because of the strong propagation characteristics of 600 MHz, "in a rural location you can cover a lot of geography." Moreland said he "absolutely" anticipates helping carriers deploy 600 MHz in the years ahead, and said he thinks it could spur fixed LTE services in rural areas. "I think that's a very compelling product," he said. "Because there's not a good alternative in a lot of rural settings for broadband Internet."

Many carriers and wired broadband providers find it too costly to lay fiber in rural areas, depriving rural customers from the high-speed broadband that consumers in the suburbs and urban areas can more easily access. "The LTE signal at the house is much better than anything else you are going to get through the alternative provider, whether there's satellite or copper," he said.

Moreland also addressed comments made recently by American Tower CEO Jim Taiclet, who said on the company's first-quarter earnings conference call that Sprint would need to roll out an additional 30,000-40,000 transmission sites if the carrier wants its 2.5 GHz TD-LTE network to reach coverage parity with its 1900 MHz networks.

Taiclet offered what he said was a "theoretical construct" regarding what it will take for Sprint to match its 1900 MHz coverage with its 2.5 GHz spectrum, which has much weaker propagation characteristics.

"I shy away from speaking on behalf of our carrier customers about what they need to do or what they should do," Moreland said. "I don't think that plays real well at Sprint when somebody shows up on a public call and says you need to build 40,000 sites. I suspect he was merely making the comparison of the spectral inefficiency of the 2.5 vs. the 1.9, and in theory what you'd have to have is that many more sites."

In other Sprint news, Moreland said he "would anticipate" Sprint to deploy its new 8T8R radio heads for its 2.5 GHz rollout on Crown-owned towers starting mid-year, "since we have largest concentration of Sprint sites of anybody in the country." Sprint is currently field-testing the new radios, which provide for 8 Transmitters 8 Receivers, hence the 8T8R moniker. The carrier has said the 8T8R radios deliver faster data speeds and improved overall coverage, both at the edge and in the middle of the cell, because they can send multiple data streams and provide better signal strength.

Read more about: Crown Castle, LTE
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By Mike Dano

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