Samsung signs deal with Dish for 5G radios, phones

Microelectronics Technology

03/05/2022 14:00

By Supantha Mukherjee
    May 3 (Reuters) - Samsung  005930.KS  has signed a
multi-year deal to sell equipment to Dish  DISH.O  for its
upcoming 5G network in the United States, one of the largest
radio deals for the South Korean company since its major Verizon
contract in 2020.
    Samsung set itself up as a challenger to top telecoms
equipment suppliers Nokia  NOKIA.HE  and Ericsson  ERICb.ST  in
the United States by winning a $6.6 billion deal with Verizon
 VZ.N , and the contract with Dish further cements its position.
   
    "This is a greater than a billion dollar agreement for
Samsung Networks," Alok Shah, vice president at Samsung, told
Reuters. "We will be delivering our first products to Dish later
this year." 
    Dish already has Taiwan's Microelectronics Technology Inc
 2314.TW  (MTI) and Japan's Fujitsu  6702.T  as suppliers for 5G
radios.
    Dish is building a 5G network using latest technologies that
promises to lower costs and bring in new services, and has tied
up with companies ranging from Amazon  AMZN.O  and Intel
 INTC.O  to smaller ones such as Altiostar and Mavenir.
    While Dish has not launched a commercial network yet, it has
committed to regulators to cover 20% of the U.S. population by
June, and at least 70% of the population by mid-2023.    
    "We have an objective to achieve 20% of population coverage
by June and we are well on track to achieve that," Dish Chief
Commercial Officer Stephen Bye said in an interview. 
    "We have beta users on our network for some time, testing
our network ... we just have not declared commercial launch and
you will see that in the coming weeks," he said.
    Dish, which has been setting up network infrastructure in
dozens of cities, has also faced supply chain issues that have
hurt companies globally, including in the telecom industry.
    Bye said supply chains had been tough for 12-18 months and
the challenges were not going to go away in the next couple of
months. But Dish has all the components to reach its June
coverage target.
    Dish is also testing its 5G network using Samsung Galaxy S22
phones and plans to continue using the phones throughout the
network deployment process.    
    "We are working with other device vendors and you can look
at the Boost website and you will see clearly we have
relationships with a lot of device vendors," Bye said.
    Boost Mobile, a prepaid wireless phone brand owned by Dish,
lists phones from Samsung, Motorola and Apple on its website https://www.boostmobile.com/phones.

 (Reporting by Supantha Mukherjee in Stockholm
Editing by Mark Potter)
 ((supantha.mukherjee@thomsonreuters.com; +46 70 721 1004;
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