But a month before that, Telstra revealed its own ambitions to rollout a 4G LTE network by the end of the year. It would refarm its existing 1800MHz spectrum -- traditionally used for 2G -- for the new network which would be integrated with its 850MHz HSPA+ service.

This truly brought 4G to the fore. Being the biggest telco in Australia, the news made consumers more aware of the potential advantages of 4G and spurred competitors to start thinking about their own future LTE networks.

Exactly a week later, Vodafone Hutchison Australia (VHA) made a public apology to customers regarding its lingering network coverage issues and committed $1 billion on upgrading its mobile infrastructure.

The telco also said it will gradually move its 3G network to 4G LTE as part of the upgrade. VHA partnered with Huawei, which will be fitting out the telco's 5800 2G base stations with 3G equipment that can eventually be upgraded to LTE. The vendor will also work on over 2200 new VHA base stations by the end of 2012.

Upgrade work commenced in April in parts of the Central Coast, Newcastle and the Hunter region.