LTE subs to hit a billion in five years

The world's LTE subscriber base is grow nine fold to 90 million by the end of the year, and surpass one billion by 2017, research shows.
 
Strategy Analytics predicts LTE will account for 15% of all mobile connections and generate over a third of wireless service revenues by 2017. At the projected rate of growth, the technology is easily exceeding its predecessors by speed of adoption. GSM took 12 years to reach a billion connections, and W-CDMA is expected to take nearly 11 years, while LTE is due to do it in seven.
 
Phil Kendall director of wireless operator strategies notes the strong adoption of earlier-generation wireless services is helping stimulate LTE's rapid rise. “W-CDMA launched into a world of fewer than one billion mobile connections, whereas we have over six billion connections today,” he said.