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Technology

Who Owns the Largest Cellular Network in the U.S.? 14

Posted by Cliff from the king-of-the-hill dept.
onyx00 asks: "Cellular phones are everywhere nowadays. It seems that anywhere you go almost everyone has a cellular phone. Originally the high cost of air-time hindered their success, but now even ten-year-olds can afford to have one. With the many different cellular companies however, I wonder who owns the largest segments of the cellular networks? Some companies offer nationwide service, but is this by their own network, or by use of others? Who really "owns" the cellular network? Do any companies actually use satellites to help link their cellular segments?"
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Who Owns the Largest Cellular Network in the U.S.? More

Who Owns the Largest Cellular Network in the U.S.?

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  • Sprint Claims they have the largest /digital/ network.

    There are larger networks; there are larger networks that can do digital, but not larger all digital networks. If you live near a major highway or metropolitan area, you are on their network. I have sprintPCS and i'm quite happy. They have local and national plans that beat the pants off the competition, at least for now. The most popular plans are $50/500minutes national or $75/1000. If you add $15 you can share that airtime with another phone. If you add $10 you can use the airtime for either wireless web or talking. Its great if you get stuck in a traffic jam and wonder whats goin down on slashdot while you're stuck.
    I think Horizon Wireless (Nextel + Bell Atlantic merger) is an up and coming candidate.
    At this time, Sprint can claim the largest /All Digital/ network.
  • Throughout the world I think it's probably Vodafone (or phone depending on whether theyre trying to be fasionable this week) - they own Airtouch in the USA, and Mannesmann on continental Europe, as well as their own branded network in the UK and most other places in the world - i think they also run an asian network.

    Here in europe though almost every network has 90%complete coverage though network sharing agreements, so you can use the same phone with the same number in about 16 countries (its quite cool the first time you get a phonecall in Germany on your British phone from an Italian person).
  • BellAtlantic, Airtouch Cellular, PrimeCo. have all merged to become Verizon. Combine that with the impending merger of GTE with BA, its gonna be quite large.

    here's a bit from there site:

    Verizon Wireless is the largest wireless communications provider in the U.S. with over 16 million wireless voice and data customers and nearly 4 million paging customers. The new coast-to-coast wireless provider was formed by the combination of the U.S. wireless businesses of Bell Atlantic Corp. (NYSE:BEL) and Vodafone AirTouch Plc (LSE:VOD; NYSE:VOD). The new company includes the assets from Bell

    Atlantic Mobile, AirTouch Cellular, PrimeCo Personal Communications and AirTouch Paging. Verizon Wireless will be further strengthened by the addition of the wireless assets of GTE Corp. (NYSE:GTE) when it completes its merger with Bell Atlantic. When the merger is complete, the new company will have a footprint covering more than 90% of the U.S. population, 49 of the top 50 and 96 of the top 100 U.S. markets. Verizon Wireless, headquartered in New York City and Bedminster, NJ, is 30,000 employees strong.


    more info can be found here [verizonwireless.com]

    bpd
  • This is absolutely correct. AT&T has great coverage and it looks like Verizon should be good as well. I have the AT&T 1 rate plan. I am constantly travelling all over North America and I am very happy with the service. Many of my friends and people I work with have service from CellOne or SprintPCS. They often do not have service when I do but I always seem to have service when they do. Also, the 1 rate plan is great for people who travel a lot because there are never roaming charges if you are w/in the U.S.
  • when it comes to the wireless market its all about the footprint. I am sure BA looked at their current network makup closly and weighed their choice on that. Its all about whose got the Cell Sites and Where. The networking can be overhauled over time and the networking infrastructure remapped but putting up new towers/stations is a time consuming process. It is easier to buy an existing network then it is to apply with all the regulaatory agencies and state/local gov'ts to put up a new site. Then you have zoning restrictions, enviromental impact studies and the lot. too much hassle.

    BA's wireless network is very strong IMHO. I used to work with CellularONE in Greenbelt, MD (the very first CellularONE infact the second company to offer Cellular to consumers waaaaay back when, I think the first was in Chicago). And I felt their product was superior's to CellularONEs digital offering in the Washington Metro area.

    So given the past performance of PrimeCo and BA, chances are their network infrastructure will be reworked.

    bpd
  • The Verizon Wireless network infrastructure will have 4 billion dollars invested in it in the next year. It will be the largest CDMA network anywhere, with the capacity to handle more voice and wireless data than any other US competitor.

  • I think Horizon Wireless (Nextel + Bell Atlantic merger) is an up and coming candidate. At this time, Sprint can claim the largest /All Digital/ network.

    The name is incorrect, they are not Nextel & Bell Atlantic Mobile
    It is PrimeCo. (Mid America)Air Touch(Scattered) and Bell Atlantic Mobile(Entire east coast and as far out as Arizona)

    If you live in the NYC area and have tried Sprint, you know what crappy service is !(don't go outside of the 5 boroughs you wont get service)

    P.S. - I wonder how Slashdot looks on HDML ! Get on this Rob !
    They have merged and became VerisonWireless [verisonwireless.com] They have the widest coverage area of all cellular systems
    I think AT&T wireless has the most subscribers (much to the detriment of thier bottom line, A LOT of people don't pay the bills due to not having credit restrictions !) Remember that when you plunk your money on the AT&T wireless stock.


    - Save The Whales ,Collect the whole set !
  • Currently, I am on one of the smallest providers in the area (Fido/Microcell) which is a GSM provider in Canada. Coverage only exists in metro areas, but I was amazed at how well I could roam to other providers.

    I did a road trip 4 weeks ago from Ontario to Florida, and was only out of signal for 1 hour out of 24, never had a problem receiving calls, voice mail worked perfectly, and the charges weren't all that bad.

    While it would be nice to be on a full coverage network, it roams so well, who cares?
  • In terms of the actual coverage size of a single network, it's a toss-up between AT&T and the new Bell Atlantic/Vodaphone joint venture, Verizon. SBC/Bell South are also merging their wireless networks, but I don't think they have the same nationwide coverage that the other two ventures do. Sprint does have the largest _all-digital_ network but their digital network is not the largest- it's a little disingenuous, considering that there's really only one other all digital nationwide network (Voicestream/Omnipoint/Aerial). The digital networks of AT&T and Verizon are still larger than Sprint's, but they still have analog coverage in some areas. As for who will really give you the most seamless coverage across the country, AT&T's 1-rate plan will let you roam into all sorts of crappy little local providers' (i.e. companies that resell as Cellular One) areas with no roaming charges, although Verizon will also apparently do this now (they've started quite recently).

    Cellular networks really are owned by the provider, or at least the radios on the towers and the spectrum rights. There's a trend in the industry towards tower consolidation, where independent companies buy the towers from cellular providers and then resell tower space to other providers in the area.

    No cellular company uses satellites. There is at least one satellite company (Globalstar) that sells phones that use terrestrial networks as long as you're in range and then switch to satellite service when you're not. These services are often resold under a local provider's name, but the cellular company does not own or operate the satellites.
  • If you do a lot of travelling, definitely go with AT&T's One Rate plan. I've used it for almost two years and have had very, very few problems with it. (The most common problem seems to be the voice mail system crashing for several days at a time in the DC/Baltimore/Philly areas. Very frustrating when it happens, but they've also refunding part of my monthly fee to compensate. Note that it's only happened twice in two years.) I used my Nokia 6162 as my only phone -- it was that reliable! I got service in even the most backwater, rinky-dink towns. (Well, OK, it dropped my calls every time I passed by the CIA's Bush campus, but that's probably not their fault. :-)

    I just moved to the SF Bay area and, ufortunately, AT&T doesn't offer local service here. I had to switch to GTE and buy all new equipment, since GTE is the only other provider who currently offers a plan like AT&T's One Rate. However, they're CDMA-based, whereas AT&T is TDMA. I don't like the CDMA phones as much (ended up with a Motorola StarTac), but it's mainly a features issue; the voice quality and coverage seems comparable, or maybe just a tad less.

    With either plan you just can't beat the "no long distance" and "no roaming" versus traditional plans.
  • Aslo I know for a fact that Sprint uses CellularONE's cell sites in the Washington Metro area. They simply buy the capacity from CellularONE. I am sure they have similar agreements with other providers throughout the country.

    bpd
  • Sprint's not totally limited to the 5 boroughs, although there are certain quirks in the service. Certain parts of Queens (especially as you approach Long Island) go out of service on one block, and back in the next. I'll admit that it's a problem, but it's nothing that a dual band phone can't adjust to. I think Sprint realizes this, which is why they've been tossing in 3 free hours of analog service in their contracts recently.

    However, even more strange is that on a bus ride from NYC to Boston, I never went out of service at all. I don't know how important that might be to anyone else, but it's nice to know that I'll tend to have flawless service on the road. (Not when I'm driving though, that's a tad braindead.)

    Also, as far as I can tell, Sprint's no worse than the other providers available. Omnipoint and AT&T have similar quality problems to Sprint, and Cellular One's service in NYC is less than ideal as well. Don't even ask about Bell Atlantic, 'tis to laugh. :-)

    Raptor
  • Sprint has been great for me. The free long distance aspect pretty much pays for the cost of the service. Their roaming costs while on other networks are very straightforward. Also, I've found their customer service to be excellent.

    I haven't tried using any of their wireless web services yet.

  • Coverage in the bay area is very bad. I have had dropped calls driving down a couple of city blocks in downtown Berkeley, and San Jose. Sound quality is poor, and much of the time I'd be out of range, even in a major metropolitan area. I strongly urge you to reconsider choosing Sprint if you live around here. Also, if you're going up to Tahoe/Reno then don't count on any service past Sacramento, cuz you won't get any.

    Sprint's rates are great, and it's cool that you can check how many minutes you've used over the web, but actual phone service sucks! To their credit, I know people who live on the East Coast and have no problems with Sprint, except when they come out here that is.

    I've also had experience in this area with GTE (super expensive, but great sound quality and coverage) and Pac Bell (great price, lots of features, great quality and coverage but doesn't work in buildings) and can recommend them both.

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