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Sprint claims that AT&T is deliberately misleading consumers over the marketing of its 5G Evolution product
US carrier Sprint has taken a series swipe at its rival, AT&T, by filing a lawsuit against America’s biggest telco over its rebranding of its LTE-Advanced services as ‘5G Evolution’.
Sprint’s suit claims that customers were being wilfully mislead into believing that they were receiving an early version of true 5G technology.
"AT&T has employed numerous deceptive tactics to mislead consumers into believing that it currently offers a coveted and highly anticipated fifth generation wireless network, known as 5G. What AT&T touts as 5G, however, is nothing more than an enhanced fourth generation Long Term Evolution wireless service, known as 4G LTE Advanced, which is offered by all other major wireless carriers," Sprint said, upon filing its suit.
AT&T’s decision has been widely derided by the US telecoms industry, with T-Mobile and Verizon also objecting loudly to AT&T’s marketing tactics.
Sprint claims that it has commissioned a survey which shows that 43 per cent of consumers believe that if they purchase a smartphone handset through AT&T today that it will be 5G compatible – something that is clearly untrue.
AT&T has compounded the problem by releasing an update for its Android and IOS customers which causes a 5G-E logo to appear whenever the customer is connected to LTE-Advanced services.
AT&T has yet to publicly comment on the allegations against it.
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