Everything Everywhere has announced the launch of EE, a new brand which will offer the first UK 4G service.

The arrival of EE was announced at an event at London’s Science Museum this morning in which CEO Olaf Swantee introduced the brand to the gathered media.

The newly established EE is set to become the umbrella network for Orange and T-Mobile and will operate a 3G service in addition to its new 4G services with customers of the existing brands being moved over to the service provider.

An initial roll-out of the 4G EE service will hit 16 UK cities before the end of 2012 encompassing Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Derby, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hull, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Nottingham, Newcastle, Sheffield and Southampton.

Swantee said of the roll-out: “London will be the first major European city to be covered by 4G.

“We plan to have 4G services available to 20 million in the UK. The EE network will cover 70 per cent by 2013, 90 per cent of UK by 2014.”

The announcement also saw confirmation of manufacturers and devices to run on the network, including the Samsung Galaxy SIII LTE, HTC One XL, Nokia Lumias 820 and 920, and the Huawei Ascend P1 LTE.

Alongside the new 4G network, EE will also operate fibre broadband to homes across the UK and will be extending its presence in the market by rebranding existing UK Orange and T-Mobile stores as EE retail outlets.

Check out our ultimate guide to 4G for a full rundown on the technology.