is a
Telecommunications company located in
Little Rock, Arkansas . Alltel provides wireless, local telephone, long-distance, Internet and high-speed data services to residential and business customers in 36 states.
With a market cap of 24.79 billion and over 15 million customers as of early 2006. Alltel is the largest regional mobile phone company in America, and the fifth largest mobile phone company overall. The wireless group provides service in parts of 36 states. The company mainly focuses on small to medium-sized cities, but has low-cost roaming agreements with the major national
CDMA carriers, especially
Verizon , in order to provide national service, in turn providing those carriers with coverage in rural areas. When Alltel aquired
Western Wireless in
2005 it also gained a large
GSM footprint as well. While it does not offer GSM service to its own customers, Alltel has indicated that it will continue to maintain the GSM footprint (and perhaps even expand it) to provide roaming service to GSM users of other wireless carriers. Alltel advertises itself as "owner and operator of the nation's largest wireless network;" this refers to geographical coverage rather than number of customers.
Alltel operates primarily 800 MHz CDMA using equipment manufactured by Lucent, Motorola and Nortel. Alltel has recently added a few 1900 MHz PCS sites in various places, such as Jacksonville, Florida. Their original network of
AMPS (Advanced Mobile Phone Service) cellular is still in place, but the company acknowledges that they are aggressively converting analog customers to digital. In 2005, an Alltel spokesman stated that only 15% of their customer base still uses analog. Alltel has yet to release official plans for the FCC decision stating that by March 1, 2008 A and B side carriers are no longer required to support analog.
Alltel uses the
Brew interface on their phones.
This map represents Alltel-owned and operated networks. Alltel currently has roaming agreements with every major provider in the US to provide coverage in all 50 States. Alltel also has agreements with cellular providers in Canada.
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To further extend service to its customers, Alltel uses roaming agreements with competing providers to provide reliable coast to coast service. Roaming agreements are primarily with
Verizon Wireless , but other arrangements are in place with
US Cellular ,
Cingular ,
Sprint PCS , and most Canadian cellular providers. Since many of these roaming partners operate in the 800 MHz or 1900 MHz CDMA band, Alltel customers on national calling plans are required to use tri-mode (800 AMPS, 800 CDMA, 1900 CDMA) handsets.
In
1943 , Allied Telephone Co., a small business specializing in installing telephone poles and cabling for telephone companies across
Arkansas , was founded by Charles Miller and Hugh Willbourn, Jr.
Alltel's modern history begins in
1983 when Allied Telephone and Mid-Continent Telephone, founded by Weldon W. Case and his brother, Nelson H., merged. In
1985 , Alltel launched its first wireless system in
Charlotte, NC and by
1993 Alltel had opened its first wireless retail store. Alltel was named to the
S&P 500 Index in
1994 . By
1996 long-distance service was offered and in
1997 the company's wireless and wireline businesses converged into a single organization.
On on April 10, 2006 and is expected to begin operations under the new brand in mid-
2006 .
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1998
- 360 Communications ( IL ) - wireless properties and assets, merger adds 2.6 million customers in 15 states
1999
- Standard Group, Inc. ( Cornelia, GA ) - merger adds more than 71,000 local telephone lines
- Aliant Communications ( Lincoln, NE ) - $1.8 billion merger
- Liberty Cellular ( KS ) - $600 million merger
2000
2002
- Verizon ( KY ) - $1.9 billion for local access lines
- CenturyTel - $1.5 billion, 700,000 wireless customers
2003
2005
2006
- First Cellular Mt. Vernon ( IL ) - Alltel will purchase First Cellular for $14-15 million in cash.
- Palmetto MobileNet, L.P. ( NC ) ( SC ) - Alltel has purchased from Palmetto MobileNet, L.P., wireless partnerships that cover approximately 2 million people in North and South Carolina. Alltel already managed and owned 50 percent of each of the 10 partnerships and has purchased the remaining interests from Palmetto. The partnerships include 34 counties across South Carolina and seven counties in western North Carolina.
On
January 10 ,
2005 , Alltel announced it would buy
Western Wireless (primary operator of the
Cellular One brand name) for $6 billion in a stock-and-cash transaction. The deal would bring in an additional 1.4 million domestic wireless customers bringing the company's total wireless customer base to 10 million in 33 states, making Alltel the fifth-largest wireless operator in the United States. The merger would also bring an additional 1.6 million international customers from Western Wireless' overseas wireless ventures. These ventures, however, are being sold. Since both companies operate on
CDMA technology, no major network integration issues were expected. According to Alltel CEO Scott Ford, "probably much less than 10 percent" of Western Wireless' 4,000 workers would face job cuts. The merger closed in August 2005; the Cellular One brand name was sold to
Dobson Cellular in December 2005.
Alltel is a major sponsor of the #12
Dodge Charger driven by
Ryan Newman .
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- Alltel Pavilion , Raleigh, North Carolina
- Alltel Arena , North Little Rock, Arkansas
- Alltel Stadium , Jacksonville, Florida
- Alltel Ice Den , Scottsdale, Arizona
- Alltel Pavilion , Stuart C. Siegel Center, Virginia Commonwealth University , Richmond, Virginia
- Alltel Racing
