Not too surprisingly, Sprint's 4G phone buildout is largely going to mirror that of their spun-off Clearwire mobile WiMax venture, according to a press release issued by the company this morning. Earlier this month, Clearwire announced they'd be deploying their network -- currently only available in Baltimore and Portland -- into eight additional markets this year. In turn, Comcast says they'll be reselling Clearwire service in Portland soon, with additional cities on deck.

According to Sprint, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas/Fort Worth, Honolulu, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, Portland and Seattle should see service this year. A few smaller markets you may have heard of will come online in 2010, including Boston, Houston, New York, San Francisco and Washington DC. Sprint isn't saying which of these markets will go live next, but Chicago has been live (though not commercially available) for some time now.

Sprint will essentially be operating as an MVNO on the Clearwire network, and will be offering a lot of gear that provides CDMA/WiMax/Wi-Fi connectivity. Sprint already offers a $80 U300 CDMA/WiMax modem card to users in Portland, and insists a number of new devices are on tap for 2009, including "a single-mode 4G data card, embedded laptops, a small-office-home-office broadband modem and a tri-mode phone."