Optus has announced that it has accelerated plans to offer national HSDPA across Australia. By the end of 2008 Optus plans coverage of 96% of the population, a year earlier than originally announced. The new schedule matches rival Vodafone’s plans to complete its 3G network, giving it 95% coverage, by the end of 2008. Both Vodafone and Optus are lagging behind Telstra in the race to offer mobile voice and broadband services nationally. Telstra launched its Next G network late in 2006 and now claims coverage of 98% of the population. Optus will use a combination of 900MHz and 2100MHz frequency ranges to complete the network, and has appointed Huawei and Nokia Siemens Networks for the completion of the roll out.