'Un-carrier' T-Mobile going against rivals on network quality

For the last year, T-Mobile has earned a reputation as the scrappy upstart of the wireless industry. CEO John Legere has taken on the big boys in deeds and words - some of them unprintable, burnishing his Mad John persona - while targeting very real customer "pain points": overage charges, exorbitant overseas data costs, early-termination fees, and the like.

Now the "Un-carrier" has another unexpected move up its sleeve: competing with the big boys on network quality - and outpacing them, in some key cities, on speed.

Before you grimace and pay another big bill to Verizon or AT&T, maybe you should take a new look at what T-Mobile has achieved with its billions of dollars in network upgrades - partly financed by a $3 billion breakup fee from AT&T after regulators pushed back against a merger three years ago.

Last month, for the second time this year, T-Mobile tied Verizon for first place in the Philadelphia market in ranking by RootMetrics, a Seattle company that tests wireless performance around the country. Both edged out AT&T and scored well ahead of Sprint for overall quality.

Although T-Mobile trailed Verizon for reliability and call performance, as did AT&T and Sprint, the number-four carrier was tops for speed and texting, and tied with Verizon as best in data performance. (See all the results at www.rootmetrics.com.)

While 1,500 T-Mobile staffers gathered in Center City last week for a preholiday sales conference, I took a ride with T-Mobile's chief technology officer, Neville Ray, and regional vice president Tom Ellefson so they could show off T-Mobile's successes with a network whose slogan is "Data Strong."

Parked near the Liberty Bell, Ray and Ellefson performed the same Ookla broadband speed test you can do anytime you want on a mobile device or a home computer, via a free app or at www.speedtest.net. Three tests in a row on identical iPhones yielded results that backed the RootMetrics rankings - good enough, for that matter, to make the executives crow. T-Mobile not only led the field, it lapped its competitors.

T-Mobile averaged download speeds of about 54 megabits per second, and uploads of 20 Mbps. Verizon, in second place, averaged 26 Mbps for downloads and 12 Mbps for uploads. AT&T followed at 18 Mbps for downloads and 7 Mbps for uploads. Sprint did better with uploads, which averaged 4 Mbps, than downloads, at 2 Mbps.

A single series of tests - all on each carrier's LTE network - doesn't prove anything, of course. In RootMetrics' most recent May data on all the markets it tests, T-Mobile still trails the top dogs.

But Ray said the Center City results illustrated the fruits of T-Mobile's push to optimize its network for data and expand its national LTE footprint.

"We've been committing more and more of our spectrum to LTE," said Ray, who said T-Mobile's speedy network technology now reached portions of the country where 250 million people live, and would reach 300 million by the end of 2015.

T-Mobile reports about 53 million total customers, not even half the number claimed by Verizon or AT&T, though contesting Sprint for third place. While Ray wouldn't comment on the latest talk of merger, this time pairing T-Mobile with Sprint, he was adamant T-Mobile could go it alone.

"We absolutely can support an independent path for this company," Ray told me. And he says customers are "voting with their feet." In the Philadelphia market, T-Mobile reports 70 percent year-over-year subscriber growth.

T-Mobile isn't just data strong, it's spectrum strong, too - with about 50 percent more bandwidth per subscriber than AT&T or Verizon, Ray says.

Growth will eat that advantage, of course, but T-Mobile hopes to accommodate it by using its spectrum more efficiently, by pushing technologies such as "Voice over LTE" and WiFi calling.

Weary of the big boys? It's clear T-Mobile is worth another look.

215-854-2776 @jeffgelles

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