AT&T to deploy LTE-Advanced in 2013

AT&T Mobility (NYSE:T) will launch LTE-Advanced network technology in 2013, a top company executive said Tuesday while speaking at the LTE North America conference in Dallas.

Krish Prabhu, president and CEO of AT&T Labs,  made the statement, which was later confirmed by an AT&T spokeswoman. However, she declined to elaborate on the nature or timing of the LTE-Advanced deployment.  

LTE-Advanced is considered a significant upgrade of LTE, which will allow operators to take advantage of advanced topology networks and also deliver improvements in capacity and coverage.

Prabhu's announcement today is the first time AT&T has provided a time frame for LTE-Advanced. Sprint Nextel (NYSE:S) said in October it will deploy LTE-Advanced on its 800 MHz spectrum by the first half of 2013. Clearwire (NASDAQ:CLWR) has said it can deploy LTE-Advanced technology in a TDD-LTE overlay on top of its mobile WiMAX network, if it can get an additional $600 million in financing. Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ) has not yet announced when it might deploy LTE-Advanced.

AT&T's LTE rollout is still in its early stages. On Sunday the company launched LTE service in Athens, Ga., Baltimore, Boston and Washington, D.C. In September AT&T launched LTE service in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio. The company has said it plans to have LTE deployed in 15 markets covering 70 million POPs by year-end.

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