Availability of traditional cell sites insufficient to support increasing data demand

MONTREAL, CANADA & SEATTLE, USA: New radio access technology and additional spectrum alone will not provide sufficient additional mobile capacity according to the second issue of the 4Ggear Quarterly Report on 4G Infrastructure trends.

Per-capita mobile data-usage will grow 10,000 percent in the next five years. The growth driven by heavy SmartPhone markets requires carriers adopt new approaches to RAN deployment and management. This is driving increased interest in picocell base stations and innovative backhaul solutions.

"As conventional macrocell approaches fall short, service providers are going to be deploying more RAN equipment to deal with the demand," stated Chad Pralle, lead author of the latest 4GgearTM report. "Vendors will need to provide solutions that enable service providers to do this cost-effectively."

"Self-Organizing Networks will become a necessary component of networks as service providers are forced to increase the number of base stations in their network in the face of comparatively modest revenue growth" said Maravedis Research Director Adlane Fellah.

"The trend to consolidate 4G efforts around 3GPP LTE benefits suppliers, service providers and consumers by reducing confusion in the marketplace, and leads the industry into the growth phase of 4G," stated Robert Syputa, co-author of the report and Senior Advisor at Maravedis Research.

This quarter's select key findings
* Short term WiMAX growth will be driven by mainstream mobile networking, and medium-term growth will be driven by deployments across specific vertical markets requiring fixed/nomadic access Femtocells will decrease in importance in the face of all-IP networks in lieu of WiFi with increased SmartPhone penetration.

* Ericsson and Huawei tie for the number one spot in our ranking of LTE vendors' future potential.