Sprint plays catch-up with its own early upgrade program & latest LTE expansion

Sprint may be lagging behind its larger competitors, but it’s trying its best to stay competitive.

The company announced today that its expanding its LTE network to 34 new cities, bringing its total to 185. That, while respectable, is still a bit behind the LTE rollouts of AT&T and Verizon, which have reached roughly 400 and 500 markets, respectively.

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Sprint’s news comes just a few months after it completed its acquisition of Clearwire, which will supplement its 4G network, and also amid the ongoing shutdown of its Nextel network, which has already cost it $1.6 billion.

But Sprint catching-up elsewhere as well.

Alongside the LTE updates comes the news that Sprint launching One Up, its own take on T-Mobile’s Jump early upgrade program. Like Next and Edge, the program is meant to give Sprint’s customers a way to upgrade their phones once every year as opposed to the previous standard of every two years.

Considering that Sprint doesn’t plan to officially announce One Up until this Thursday, we’ll withhold our full judgement on the program until then. So far, though, it looks as if Sprint is learning more from T-Mobile than AT&T or Verizon, which is a good thing for its customers.