As Nextel Shutdown Looms, AT&T Plans to Bring Push-to-Talk to the iPhone
With Sprint’s shutdown of the Nextel network slated for the end of the month, rival AT&T is looking to get as many of the company’s remaining customers as possible.
On Monday, AT&T is announcing that it plans to offer Nextel-like push-to-talk capabilities on the iPhone.
It’s part of a broad investment AT&T has made in push-to-talk in an effort to win business customers. Sprint, which plans to shutter the Nextel network as of June 30, has also been adding various push-to-talk capabilities to phones running on its main network. However, it has yet to announce such support on the iPhone.
AT&T said that its push-to-talk service on the iPhone will allow large contact lists of up to 1,000 names and the ability to group-call up to 250 people at once.
The service, enabled through an app, will work on the iPhone 4S and iPhone 5, AT&T said.