Ericsson looks to LTE for boosting Middle East revenues

With operators in the Middle East region starting to embrace LTE as the optimum way forward, Ericsson is expecting to see its revenues from the region double by 2015.

According to Ericsson's president for the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) area, Ray Hassan, the company has begun to see a return on, or stabilisation of, its investments in the GCC region, "and next year we are forecasting some considerable growth. We see a lot of opportunity in this region because it is not as mature as the western markets," said Hassan.

The Middle East region contributed around 10 per cent of Ericsson's total global revenues in 2009, or just under US$3 billion, according to Ericsson's 2009 financial report.

However, the exec now believes operators in the Middle East are keen to adopt LTE believing the technology will provide them with a technological advantage over their rivals and a new source of revenue.

"It will all be LTE now. Almost every operator in the region is now implementing or trying LTE. We expect more in 2011 and especially in 2012 to really take shape," said Hassan.

Separately, Ericsson said it had agreed to pay US$50 million in cash to acquire Guangdong Nortel Telecommunication Equipment (GDNT), an R&D and manufacturing firm in which Nortel Networks and Nortel China owned 62 per cent.

GDNT became a supplier to Ericsson after the Swedish firm bought Nortel's CDMA and GSM businesses. Nortel said it expected to close the sale in the first quarter of 2011.

For more:
- see this Total Telecom article
- see this Reuters article

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