Rinne opens Fierce 4G event

At yesterday's "Path to 4G" event presented by FierceMarkets and held at CTIA Wireless 2008, AT&T Senior Vice President, Architecture & Planning Kris Rinne told the audience of more than 200 wireless executives that there is still a lot of room to grow in 3G and the company is planning to upgrade its HSDPA network to HSUPA before it moves to LTE, which offers speeds of 100 Mbps and beyond. She expects the LTE deployment to occur in 2010.

Although the ITU has not yet defined a 4G standard, Rinne said that she anticipates that LTE will meet the future definition. She also said that migrating to LTE is not just about speed but also about better support for services such as VOIP.

Rinne says that AT&T is continuing to invest in its 3G network and by year-end, she expects that 75 percent of the company's wireless handsets sold at retail will be 3G. -Sue