Cricket beefs up network with Acme Packet, GenBand

Cricket wireless over the past few years. They figure to grow even further in the near future, as they begin to roll out their AWS network. So they’re going to need to upgrade their network. They took care of that in two ways, first with Acme Packet, which will aid with VoIP connections, and GenBand, which will provide voice enhancements. These are both technical deals, so i won’t harp on the jargon-filled details. What I can say is that this goes along with a trend I’ve been hearing about in the industry. When people think of mobile VoIP, most of them will think of something like Skype for your mobile phone. However, that’s not exactly the case. Many carriers — Sprint is the one I’ve heard about — are aiming to get more and more of their activity onto the data portion of their network. I don’t want to get too into it, because my understanding is rudimentary. But the idea is to have everything running on, for instance, EVDO, because it will make the network more efficient as a whole. So it appears that the deal with Acme Packet is a related move. In the end, it will give Cricket a more efficient network that can handle the increase that they figure to see over the next two years, as they adopt a 3G platform. ]]>