As expected, Sprint is providing 4G service in the markets in which Clearwire established WiMAX coverage last week, and Time Warner Cable will commence with mobile Road Runner in two of those same cities that are in its footprint.
Last week, Clear announced the following markets: Rochester and Syracuse, N.Y.; Merced and Visalia, Calif.; Eugene, Ore.; and Tri-Cities and Yakima, Wash.
Sprint will be in all of them. TWC, meanwhile, will start reselling Clear WiMAX in Rochester and Syracuse on Aug. 1, according to multiple local news sources.
Sprint owns the majority Clearwire stock. TWC is a major investor, along with Comcast, Bright House Networks, Google and Intel.
The lack of presence in the two largest markets in the U.S. is just one shortcoming for Sprint and Clearwire identified in a Wall Street Journal article today.
The article says the company is hindered by a shortage of the new HTC Evo phones, with no delivery date in sight. The shortage was attributed to a lack of third-party parts, including touchscreens.
It also quotes Sprint CEO Dan Hesse saying he’d hoped to have a greater head start over Sprint’s wireless rivals. Verizon is expecting to start providing LTE (like WiMAX, a 4G technology) later this year, and AT&T next year.
Another factor that might be giving some opportunity back to Verizon and AT&T is that Clear is not yet turned on in the country’s two largest markets. Clearwire still has Los Angeles and New York (and Miami) on the schedule for its WiMAX build-out this year.
