Erythropoietin (EPO) allows erythroid precursors to proliferate while protecting them from apoptosis. Treatment of the EPO-dependent HCD57 murine cell line with 70 micromol/L orthovanadate, a tyrosine phosphatase inhibitor, resulted in both increased tyrosine protein phosphorylation and prevention of apoptosis in the absence of EPO without promoting proliferation. Orthovanadate also delayed apoptosis in primary human erythroid progenitors. Thus, we investigated what survival signals were activated by orthovanadate treatment. Expression of Bcl-X(L) and BAD phosphorylation are critical for the survival of erythroid cells, and orthovanadate in the absence of EPO both maintained expression levels of antiapoptotic Bcl-X(L) and induced BAD phosphorylation at serine 112. Orthovanadate activated JAK2, STAT1, STAT5, the phosphatidylinositol-3 kinase (PI-3 kinase) pathway, and other signals such as JNK and p38 without activating the EPO receptor, JAK1, Tyk2, Vav, STAT3, and SHC. Neither JNK nor p38 appeared to have a central role in either apoptosis or survival induced by orthovanadate. Treatment with cells with LY294002, an inhibitor of PI-3 kinase activity, triggered apoptosis in orthovanadate-treated cells, suggesting a critical role of PI-3 kinase in orthovanadate-stimulated survival. Mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) was poorly activated by orthovanadate, and inhibition of MAPK with PD98059 blocked proliferation without inducing apoptosis. Thus, orthovanadate likely acts to greatly increase JAK/STAT and PI-3 kinase basal activity in untreated cells by blocking tyrosine protein phosphatase activity. Activated JAK2/STAT5 then likely acts upstream of Bcl-X(L) expression and PI-3 kinase likely promotes BAD phosphorylation to protect from apoptosis. In contrast, MAPK/ERK activity correlates with only EPO-dependent proliferation but is not required for survival of HCD57 cells.