LTE - to grow to 400 million by 2015

LTE subscriber base expected to reach 400-450Mn by 2015

Huawei Technologies Co Ltd. ("Huawei"), a leader in providing next generation telecommunication solutions to operators around the world, today said that they will provide LTE/SAE infrastructure to mobile operators based on multi-standard base stations and their first commercial LTE/SAE network is expected to be ready by June 2009.

Speaking at SAMENA Telecommunications Council’s ‘Convergence to Jordan 2008’ on ‘Preparing for the future technology trends – LTE focus’ Mr. Ihab Ghattas, Assistant President, Huawei Technologies Middle East said, “The rapid development and benefits of wireless technology has seen mobile broadband evolve from UMTS / HSPA/HSPA+ to LTE which offers more efficiency than other networks. Expectations are that by 2015 LTE subscriber base will reach 400-450 million generating revenues of almost EUR 150 billion.”

According to ABI Research, nearly 300,000 LTE Base Transceiver Stations will be installed and network operators will invest a total of almost $18 billion in LTE capital infrastructure by 2014.

Added Mr. Ghattas, “LTE and SAE (System Architecture Evolution) are 3GPP (3rd Generation partnership projects) concepts defining long-term evolution for radio access technology and core network respectively but when enhanced they are no longer inseparable. LTE can be deployed by operators with heavy UMTS investments as a complement at hot spots as well as by operators who plan to directly deploy LTE on a wide scale.”

Huawei is the main sponsor and participant of LTE research and standardization with more than two hundred contributions in LTE RAN in 2006 which occupies 7% of total contributions as well as being a member of NGMN.

Huawei is an active member of LSTI reflecting their commitment to contributing significantly to the development of HSPA, HSPA+ and LTE technologies. Huawei takes part in the IOT work to promote the LTE industry and has received high acclaim from the board of LTE/SAE Trial Initiative for its performance in global HSP and LTE fields.