The company ended the year with 4.4 million subscribers, up from 688,000 a year earlier. About 1.1 million of those were customers of Clearwire's own retail service, called Clear, while 3.3 million bought service on the WiMax network through partners such as Sprint Nextel and Comcast. The company collects far less revenue from wholesale than from retail subscribers and has previously disclosed disputes with Sprint over that revenue. In its financial press release Thursday, Clearwire said it believes a settlement of those issues with Sprint is imminent.