US : Verizon Wireless, the nation’s largest and most reliable wireless voice network and the leader in next generation technology deployment, will begin immediately to expand its BroadbandAccess service nationally. Powered by Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) third generation (3G) wide-area network, BroadbandAccess commercial service, with average user speeds of 300-500 kilobits per second (kbps), is expected to be available in many major U.S. cities this summer.

Denny Strigl, president and CEO of Verizon Wireless, said, “Verizon Wireless has earned the reputation as the nation’s most reliable wireless service provider because of our focus on our network. Building on that success, we are offering BroadbandAccess to our business and individual customers who are ready to move to the next level of mobile communications: tremendous speed, rich graphic content, video, music and more. In announcing the national expansion of this exciting new service, we pledge to remain relentless in our pursuit of providing the highest quality voice and data services.”

Verizon Wireless 3G Network Benefits
BroadbandAccess, the fastest commercial wide-area wireless data technology available today, is based on CDMA technology—a digital wireless technology commercially developed by QUALCOMM. Since October 2003, BroadbandAccess has been successfully deployed in Washington D.C. with Lucent Technologies, and in San Diego with Nortel Networks. This high-speed data network will be available to business and individual customers beginning in the summer of 2004 throughout significant portions of the Verizon Wireless national footprint, with additional markets phased in through 2005. Because it is backward compatible—a distinct advantage to using CDMA technology—customers who travel outside a BroadbandAccess area with an EV-DO device will seamlessly switch to Verizon Wireless’ existing NationalAccess network, based on 1xRTT technology.

In addition to its ongoing annual capital investment program to build network capacity and coverage, the company expects to invest $1 billion over the next two years to deploy its EV-DO technology nationally.