American wireless major T-Mobile has enhanced LTE network coverage in the areas surrounding the National Mall in Washington, DC by 1,000 percent since last year — preparing to serve more than one million anticipated attendees at the Presidential Inauguration.
T-Mobile claims that its LTE network is the fastest and most advanced in the U.S., and it covers more than 99 percent of the people Verizon covers.
ALSO READ: T-Mobile’s network coverage
Earlier, both AT&T and Verizon announced the addition of cell sites and network coverage to address mobile Internet demands during the Inauguration of president-elect Donald Trump.
“Now, we’ve juiced our coverage for customers in DC almost 1,000 percent … permanently. We did that by rolling out new LTE Advanced technologies – like 4×4 MIMO and 256 QAM – that the carriers are still just talking about,” said Neville Ray, T-Mobile CTO.
In the last year, T-Mobile has launched new LTE-Advanced technologies, enhanced sites with more spectrum – including Extended Range LTE, increased backhaul, upgraded equipment and built new facilities.
T-Mobile upgrade plans
# adding LTE spectrum to each site
# deploying three carrier aggregation for a total of 30+30 MHz of LTE
# launching 4×4 MIMO and 256 Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM)
# adding new multi-beam antennas and other upgraded equipment
# more than doubling backhaul on many sites.
T-Mobile has also deployed LTE-enabled cell sites on-wheels (COWs) which will be in place for several days prior to and following the inauguration – for additional, temporary capacity.
T-Mobile says its LTE network is the nation’s fastest and the most advanced with more LTE Advanced technologies deployed than any other US wireless provider. T-Mobile achieved a global first – which is yet to be matched in the US – with the rollout of 4×4 MIMO and 256 QAM last fall.