Telecom operators 2G, 3G and LTE 4G Capex (capital spending) is expected to dip significantly by 2019, said Infonetics Research, now part of IHS.
2G, 3G, 4G LTE mobile infrastructure market will decrease from nearly $47 billion in 2014 to $27 billion in 2019, as the planet reaches the end of macrocell mobile deployments.
In 2014, mobile infrastructure revenue grew 10 percent to $46.8 billion worldwide, due in large part to China Mobile’s TDD LTE deployment.
China Mobile has rolled out 700,000 eNodeB units as of January 2015 and plans to add another 300,000 this year.
“LTE revenue grew 69 percent in 2014 from the previous year,” said Stéphane Téral, principal analyst for mobile infrastructure and carrier economics at Infonetics Research, now part of IHS.
Recently, Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) estimated that over 450 commercial LTE networks will be launched by the end of 2015.
In Q4 2014, macrocell mobile infrastructure revenue rose 10 percent to $12 billion – thanks to TDD-LTE investment in China that overshadowed strong LTE and 3G activity in Europe and the Middle East.
Meanwhile, carrier IP telephony market grew 8 percent in 2014, said Dell’Oro Group. Voice over LTE (VoLTE) drove investments in IP multimedia subsystem core, session border controller and voice application servers. Sales of IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) core, session border controller (SBC) and voice application server (VAS) systems grew 41 percent, more than offsetting declines in mature Softswitch (SS) and Media Gateway (MG) segments.
