AT&T reiterates: LTE a long way off

AT&T reiterated its position Wednesday at the 4G Executive Summit in Chicago that its HSPA and HSPA-plus 3G network technology still had a lot of life left in it, and that Long-term Evolution (LTE) technology would not be rolled out for at least another three years--and probably not on a large commercial scale for another five years.

Hank Kafka, AT&T's VP of architecture, said it was unlikely that LTE would be seen on a wide basis for some time to come, and that AT&T has "a lot of runway left" with HSPA and HSPA-plus data speeds. LTE technology is theoretically capable of data speeds of up to 170 Mbps. 

Kafka also offered a cutting critique of Sprint's Xohm mobile WiMAX technology, which launched this week [1], called it a "niche technology," and said it was not a true 4G standard.

For more:
- see this article [2]

Related articles:
3G Americas [3]: HSPA today, LTE tomorrow
Mobile industry pushes LTE [4]