U.S. Cellular LTE expansion plans look to cover 98% of customer base

Regional wireless provider U.S. Cellular said it plans to add more than 600 LTE cell sites this year as it looks to expand coverage to 98% of its customer base across 10 states.

The expansion is set to include 2,000 towns in areas of California, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oregon, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and West Virginia. Much of that will include work with King Street Wireless, which controls the 700 MHz A-Block spectrum assets U.S. Cellular uses to power some of its LTE network.

The use of those licenses received a boost after AT&T conceded to integrating the A-Block into its lower B- and C-Block Band Class 17 plans, which will operate as Band Class 12. T-Mobile US also is moving aggressively to rollout LTE services using its 700 MHz A-Block licenses, while Sprint is moving forward with expanding the inclusion of Band Class 12 capabilities into its devices.

U.S. Cellular last year announced plans to add 1,200 LTE-enabled cell sites in 2014, in a move to expand coverage to Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma and North Carolina and bring additional LTE service to areas in Iowa, Illinois, Maine, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin.

U.S. Cellular recently showed operational improvements, reporting 96,000 net connection additions during the fourth quarter of last year, which was a strong turnaround from the 97,000 connections lost during the final quarter of 2013.

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