The market for LTE base stations in the Asia Pacific region is set for a new top dog this year, according to a report from NPD In-Stat. The region has seen the markets seven largest players – Alcatel-Lucent (ALU), Ericsson (ERIC), Huawei, NEC, Nokia Siemens Networks, Samsung and ZTE – dominate with a combined 94% of the market.
The report found that Samsung will garner the largest market share for LTE infrastructure in the region for 2011, with more than one-fourth of base stations coming from the South Korean company. NPD In-Stat predicts that Samsung will have deployed 10,000 LTE base stations across Asia Pacific by the end of the year, with a high concentration in its home market with operators LG Uplus, KT (KT) and SK Telecom.
The research firm noted that in 2009, NEC was the dominate player thanks to its relationship with Japan’s NTT DoCoMo; while Ericsson was No. 1 in 2010 thanks to a range of agreements across the region.
“It is important to note that the market is far from static,” said NPD In-Stat 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.”
The study also found that in 2015, Ericsson, Huawei, Alcatel-Lucent and ZTE will each have at least 10% of newly deployed LTE base stations; and that there will be more than 1 billion potential customers across the region covered by LTE networks, led by China, India, Indonesia and Japan.
Looking at other market segments, NPD In-Stat found that Alcatel-Lucent is expected to continue dominating the LTE EPC/router/gateway equipment market in Asia Pacific, though that leadership position is expected to weaken. Alcatel-Lucent accounted for one-third of deployments in 2010, though rivals Cisco, Huawei and Ericsson all counted double-digit share in the region.
NPD In-Stat also reports that LTE packet backhaul equipment investments by carriers across Asia Pacific will top $5 billion between 2009 and 2015, with Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Ericsson and Huawei combining to account for at least 57% of total spending.
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