Cellco Partnership, doing business as Verizon Wireless, owns and operates the second largest wireless telecommunications network in the United States, behind AT&T Mobility, based on a total of 67.2 million U.S. subscribers[1]. Based on revenue, Verizon Wireless is the largest American wireless company and largest wireless data provider, with an annual revenue of $43.9 billion. Headquartered in Basking Ridge, New Jersey, the company is a joint venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group, with 55 and 45 percent ownership respectively. Their joint network covers a population of approximately 260 million in the United States.
History
Verizon Wireless traces its roots to Bell Atlantic Mobile, NYNEX Mobile Communications, AirTouch Communications, PrimeCo Communications, and GTE Mobilnet. Bell Atlantic Mobile and NYNEX Mobile Communications merged in 1995 to create Bell Atlantic-NYNEX Mobile, and in 1997 their namesake Baby Bell parents followed suit to form the new Bell Atlantic and their wireless subsidiary was renamed Bell Atlantic Mobile. Bell Atlantic Mobile and NYNEX Mobile Communications was created from Advanced Mobile Phone Service, Inc., which was a subsidiary of AT&T created in 1978 to provide cellular service nationwide. AMPS, Inc. was divided among the RBOCs as part of the Bell System Divestiture.
Meanwhile, in June 1999, AirTouch Communications of San Francisco, California merged with UK-based Vodafone Group Plc, forming Vodafone AirTouch Plc. In September 1999, Vodafone AirTouch announced a $90-billion joint venture with Bell Atlantic Corp. to be called Verizon Wireless, and which would be comprised of the two companies' U.S. wireless assets: Bell Atlantic Mobile and AirTouch Paging. This wireless joint venture received regulatory approval in six months, and began operations as Verizon Wireless on April 4, 2000. On June 30, 2000, the addition of GTE Wireless' assets, in connection with the merger of Bell Atlantic and GTE to form Verizon Communications, made Verizon Wireless the nation's largest wireless communications provider (until Cingular's acquisition of AT&T Wireless in 2004[4]). For the joint venture, Verizon Communications owns 55% and UK-based Vodafone Group (formerly Vodafone AirTouch) owns 45%. The name "Verizon," a portmanteau, is derived by combining the word "veritas," a Latin term that means "truth," and the word "horizon." Together, they are supposed to conjure images of reliability, certainty, leadership, and limitless possibilities.[5]
On February 19, 2008, Verizon Wireless became the first of the "big" cellular companies to offer unlimited minutes talk plans.[6]
Network
Verizon Wireless is one of the six major U.S. carriers to use CDMA technology, the others being Sprint Nextel's Sprint PCS division, Alltel, U.S. Cellular, Cricket and MetroPCS (see List of United States mobile phone companies for more information). Verizon supports the 3 generations of CDMA (IS-95, 1x, and EV-DO) networks.
Verizon Wireless invests a claimed $8 billion annually to maintain and expand its nationwide CDMA network. Verizon Wireless offers voice services as well as 3G data services such as wireless broadband based on EV-DO Rev A, text and picture messaging, over-the-air downloadable applications and content from its "Get It Now" service, Video on Demand in the form of V CAST (which allows customers to download and view video content), location-based services, and Push-to-Talk.
On June 30, 2007, Verizon Wireless had completed the overhaul of the entire EV-DO network to EV-DO Rev. A. This enables PC Cards to obtain downloading speeds of 600 kbit/s to 1.4 Mbit/s and uploading speeds of 500-800 kbit/s.
On 27 November 2007, Verizon Wireless announced plans to allow all cell phones compatible with their CDMA technology to run on their network. Users of such phones are also allowed to use any application they wish. The plan should take effect by the end of 2008.[7]
However, on September 20, 2007, Verizon Wireless had announced a joint effort with the Vodafone Group to transition their networks to the 4G standard LTE[8] and on November 29, 2007, Verizon Wireless announced that they would start LTE trials in 2008. Adopting LTE would make for a gradual shift away from Verizon Wireless’ current use of CDMA technology because it is a completely different platform, but would offer increased operability for users traveling worldwide.[9]