Verizon Makes 4G LTE A Requirement For Upcoming Phones

Verizon's introduced a number of shiny new gadgets in the past week or so at CES, and as I'm sure many folks noticed, nearly every one was packing 4G LTE connectivity. That's no coincidence, as the carrier has told CNET that 4G support is "a hard requirement" for future devices. That means that almost every smartphone, tablet and hotspot that we see going forward should include LTE, although an exception to that will be Verizon's push-to-talk products. Don't think that this means that Verizon will be exclusively sticking with Android and iPhone, though, as Keith Lampron, Verizon's associate director of device marketing, said that the carrier intends to support Windows Phone in the future as well.

Major smartphone manufacturers have been coming out with new models left and right and 4G LTE appears to be a staple among their list of new features, so conforming with the network’s requirement isn’t much of a problem.

This news isn't a total surprise considering how aggressively Verizon has been in building out its 4G LTE network and picking up spectrum to support that network as of late. Of course, Verizon's requirement may not be terribly exciting for anyone that's not quite ready to make the jump to a 4G device, but it sounds like those folks may not be able to avoid LTE for much longer.

Aside from reiterating the 4G requirement for smartphones, Verizon Wireless’ CTO, David Small, also said that the company is actively pushing its network to many areas. Verizon is looking to have up to 400 areas covered by 4G LTE by the end of the year from the 200-plus currently in service.

Verizon 4G LTE Network Speed Test:

Verizon reports loss in Q4, net subscribers increase the most in three years thanks to record iPhone sales

Verizon added 1.5 million net retail customers in Q4 - that's the most the carrier has done in three years, riding high on the iPhone 4S excitement.

Its overall 7.7 million smartphone additions fell a bit short of expectations, so the 1.2 million postpaid subscribers it added were mainly due to doubling the iPhone 4S units sold to over four million, compared to the previous quarter.

The carrier still logged a loss of $2.02 billion because of one-time pension plan revaluation charge of $3.4 billion, but also thanks to the large susbsidies it shells out for all those iPhones. The carrier is, of course, hoping to recuperate the initial investment over the life span of a typical contract, which brings about $2000 to it on average.

One of the expected, but still interesting developments is the huge spike in data revenues - the carrier raked in $6.3 billion of data revenue, representing roughly 42% of its total.

This only shows the growing importance of data for carriers, with the traditional channels like voice and especially text with its huge margins, likely to get less and less important down the road. Verizon now stands at 108.7 million total subscribers.

Verizon calls in their special trailers to act as temporary cell sites at CES

Ever wonder how all of those hundreds of thousands of extra visitors to the CES at Las Vegas manage to get connected to their carrier's network to receive data or to make a call? You would think that with all of the media, corporate bigwigs and others attending the show, cellular service would be a bit sluggish or even non-existent at certain places and times.

To combat the large number of people with mobile devices, all trying to get a connection at the same time, the carriers call in their "bulls" or "cows". Those are the nicknames for the trailers that the carriers drive to locations to act as temporary cell sites. The guys from Engadget got to get a look at the inside of a Verizon trailer, and came away with the picture below. It is just one of eight trailers that Verizon is employing for CES 2012.

Trailers like the one in the picture will allow us to keep you fully updated on what is going on at CES 2012. In past years, we told you about the unveiling of such devices as the Palm Pre and the Motorola DROID BIONIC. Keep checking in with us at PhoneArena for our first-hand reports on all of the activities, starting Sunday.