Sprint Nextel CEO Dan Hesse says the operator is committed to keeping Nextel’s iDEN network despite the technology becoming increasingly marginalised. The operator is reportedly under pressure from investors to cut costs by consolidating the Nextel network into Sprint’s CDMA network and it has also been speculated recently that Sprint may spin-off Nextel to make its single-technology network a more attractive acquisition target. However, at the operator’s annual shareholder meeting yesterday, Hesse said that he wanted iDEN to be the primary choice for Nextel customers, reports Dow Jones. He admitted, however, that the iDEN technology was at risk because only a single vendor – Motorola – supports it, and that it was unlikely that other vendors would enter the market. It is even feared that Motorola may review its support of the technology in light of the vendor’s current restructuring programme.

According to MocoNews, the operator’s commitment to the technology could be related to its investment in Qualcomm’s QChat – a technology that has allowed iDEN’s pioneering ‘push-to-talk’ capabilities to work with Sprint’s CDMA network. Sprint reportedly plans to expand QChat to 80 percent of the US markets covered by its network by year-end. The report also suggests that – as the technology is able to work with Sprint’s high-speed EV-DO network – the operator may also be planning related multimedia services such as ‘push-to-send’ photos. Sprint Nextel has also invested heavily in handsets that work across both networks.