Samsung beats Ericsson in Asian LTE

MOST READ
LATEST NEWS

EVENTS

Join Orange, Amazon and Google at the Open Mobile Summit London May 29-30

MARKET PLACE

Carrier Broadband Performance: Africa & Middle East

Voice over LTE: Market Analysis and Forecasts

Advertize your telecoms job

JOBS

Experienced Event Organiser

Samsung beats Ericsson in Asian LTE

Korean firm will be lead vendor for 4G macro base stations in its home region, may be springboard for future success, says research

By CAROLINE GABRIEL

Published: 28 November, 2011

READ MORE: Metrics | Asia | Samsung | LTE

In mobile infrastructure, Ericsson is always looking over its shoulder at Huawei, but not really at Samsung, whose networks business has had none of the impact of its handsets. But the Korean vendor could have seized the number one position in LTE base stations in Asia-Pacific this year, according to estimates from NPD In-Stat, which would be a valuable springboard in the region which is likely to be the largest 4G market for much of the decade.

Samsung has leveraged its success - and huge IPR assets - in WiMAX, to carve out a position in the similar LTE technology. This started with operators which were looking to migrate from the older 4G standard to TD-LTE, such as Clearwire, but now Samsung has started to win business with non-WiMAX carriers and in LTE's FDD mode. Its flagship win outside its own country has been to gain a role in Sprint's huge Network Vision deal, alongside Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent, but most of its strength lies in Asia-Pacific, says the new report.

The analysts identify an Asian 4G macro base station market which is far more volatile than its equivalents in the west, and has more significant competitors - the big seven are ALU, Ericsson, Huawei, NEC, Nokia Siemens, Samsung and ZTE, which between them control 94% of the market. NEC, and until recently Samsung and ZTE, have been only marginal presences in the wireless infrastructure segment outside Asia.

Based on its study of cellco LTE contract awards and deployments, NPD In-Stat observes that the dominant LTE equipment provider in the region changes annually. In 2009, NEC had the lead because of being the main supplier to NTT DoCoMo, one of Asia's earliest LTE triallists. In 2010, its crown was taken by Ericsson as trials and deployments spread across the continent. In 2011, Samsung has sold over 25% of all LTE macro stations, says the report, and will finish the year with about 10,000 such units installed in Asia-Pacific, particularly among Korea's three mobile carriers.

That may seem a local and transitory situation, but Samsung's success within Sprint, its establishment of a new center to mastermind European infrastructure expansion, and its major activities in China and Japan, all show that it is determined to be a more significant player in wireless networks in the 4G era - and Asia, and specifically its hugely advanced Korean homeland, could be strong stepping stones this time. Samsung is also adopting a tactic which proved successful for Nokia and Ericsson in previous wireless generations, of harnessing its strong device developments to hook in carriers for end-to-end trials and roll-outs.

However, In-Stat puts its bets on Huawei, not Samsung, being the leader by 2015. "It is important to note that the market is far from static," said analyst Chris Kissel. "Alcatel-Lucent, Huawei, and ZTE will make strong gains in the region. By 2015, projections indicate that Huawei will lead the Asian region with the most LTE base station deployments. However, this is not yet certain as 17% of projected deployments are undecided as the infrastructure vendor of choice."

Pages: 1 | 2