Verizon Wireless Prepares For Record Speeds And Top Network Performance In Fort Worth, Texas

FORT WORTH, TX — As race fans around the country head to North Texas for this weekend's big race, Verizon Wireless crews and engineers have been hard at work for months to rev up wireless coverage for visiting fans, news media, local residents and businesses attending Sunday's race in Fort Worth.

Verizon Wireless will deploy a high-tech COW (Cell on Wheels) outside of the speedway. The unit will strengthen the already robust Verizon Wireless network in and around Fort Worth for the spike in calls, text, picture and video messages, Internet connections and other wireless traffic during the race on Nov. 8 and other speedway events during the week.

Leading up to this event, a team of Verizon Wireless network technicians has enhanced the capacity of existing sites that serve the speedway as well as the routes to and from the race. Thousands of fans are expected to descend on the 1,500-acre motor sports complex later this week. Verizon Wireless expects hundreds of thousands of successful connections over the race weekend on its Texas digital network.

Verizon Wireless, the primary sponsor on the No. 12 Verizon Wireless Dodge Charger driven by award-winning driver Justin Allgaier, celebrated its entry in the 2009 series earlier this year. Justin will make a special appearance at the Verizon Wireless Grapevine store, located at 1400 William D Tate Avenue, on Friday, November 6 at 8 p.m. Justin remains the leader in the Nationwide Series Rookie Of The Year standings. The company is also an associate sponsor of the No. 3 and No. 6 Penske teams for the 2009 IndyCar Series season.

Verizon Wireless has invested more than $50 billion nationally since the company was formed. In the first half of 2009, over $79 million was invested in Texas to power the Verizon Wireless 3G high-speed wireless network (EV-DO Rev. A). This technology drives advanced wireless services, such as V CAST — which allows customers to stream video clips, play cutting-edge 3D games and download full-song tracks over the air; and VZ Navigator(SM) — a location-based service offering maps, audible driving directions, traffic updates, gas station locations and pricing.

Verizon Championship Racing, a category available to V CAST subscribers, offers a host of multimedia options for fans including behind-the-scenes exclusive interviews with drivers, recaps of races, highlights, games, news and other racing information.

In addition, customers using the company's Mobile Broadband data service to wirelessly access their e-mail and calendars, the Internet and other information, can expect average download speeds of 600 kilobits per second (kbps) to 1.4 megabits per second and average upload speeds of 500-800 kbps. At those speeds, customers can upload or download a 1 Megabyte e-mail attachment — the equivalent of a small PowerPoint® presentation or a large PDF file — in less than two seconds.

For more information on Verizon Wireless, visit www.verizonwireless.com.

EDITOR'S NOTE: News media interested in interviewing a Verizon Wireless network technician, can contact Audrey Lundy at 972-444-5516 or Audrey.Lundy@VerizonWireless.com.

About Verizon Wireless
Verizon Wireless operates the nation's most reliable and largest wireless voice and 3G data network, serving 89 million customers. Headquartered in Basking Ridge, N.J., with 85,000 employees nationwide, Verizon Wireless is a joint venture of Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ) and Vodafone (NYSE and LSE: VOD). For more information, visit www.verizonwireless.com. To preview and request broadcast-quality video footage and high-resolution stills of Verizon Wireless operations, log on to the Verizon Wireless Multimedia Library at www.verizonwireless.com/multimedia.

####