Sprint’s WiMax service to end Nov. 6, 2015, report says

Sprint Corp.’s WiMax network, an early foray into 4G speeds, will shut down Nov. 6, 2015, according to a report from FierceWireless.com.

The older technology behind WiMax has been surpassed by Long Term Evolution, or LTE, technology. Sprint has kept its WiMax service alive because some customers continue to use it.

Sprint had said previously that it would shut down WiMax by the end of next year. FierceWireless said a Sprint spokeswoman confirmed the Nov. 6, 2015, date.

WiMax had given Sprint much-needed attention in the marketplace with the 2010 release of the HTC EVO 4G phone, but service was sparse.

Kansas City joined 33 other markets with WiMax in June 2010. It allowed then-CEO Dan Hesse to point out his EVO phone during an interview and boast that not even Steve Jobs, then head of Apple Inc., had “one of these.”

By October 2011, Sprint said it would stop selling phones with WiMax technology at the end of 2012 and follow rival wireless carriers into the LTE competition.

This story was originally published October 8, 2014 at 10:11 AM with the headline "Sprint’s WiMax service to end Nov. 6, 2015, report says."