T-Mobile To Upgrade Multimedia Services

T-Mobile USA laid out plans on Friday for the $4.2 billion wireless spectrum it won in a recent federal auction.

The company said it expects to spend nearly $2.7 billion on a network upgrade to 3G that can deliver mobile multimedia services, capabilities it lacked, but offered by other carriers.

The roll out of the 3G network is scheduled to begin this year, with most of the work completed between 2008 and 2009. Some markets will get new services enabled by the updated network in mid-2007, the company said in a statement.

T-Mobile USA said it will upgrade to a 3G network similar to what Cingular Wireless uses. The network called Universal Mobile Telecommunications System, or UMTS, will enable T-Mobile USA to offer fast mobile connections for video, music downloads and other multimedia services, said Ovum telecom analyst Roger Entner.

"Once you have UMTS adding another base band for more frequencies is easy," Entner said. "T-Mobile had to take this step. Otherwise their global strategy would have been in shambles."