Current and soon-to-be-launched LTE mobile networks will generate more than $265 billion by 2016, according to a new report from Juniper Research.
The market research firm anticipates that 4G LTE services will be particularly attractive to high traffic subscribers, both in the developing world and in developed countries.
"We believe that high end enterprise users in developing countries will be much closer in spend to similar users in North America or Western Europe and certainly very distinct from the bulk of the population that contribute towards the high level regional ARPU levels for all generations, including 2G," study author Nitin Bhas noted in a statement.
However, users in North American, Western Europe and Asia are expected to account for around 84 percent of total global revenue by 2016, simply due to the sheer number of top end users residing in developed nations.
One of the key drivers of LTE-related revenue will be premium service tariffs, which will offer guaranteed connectivity and/or service level agreements to high end enterprise users who require constant connectivity, says Juniper.
Overall, the number of consumer LTE subscribers will trump that of enterprise customers; however the consumer segment will account for less than half of all LTE-related revenue. In addition, the average revenue per user (ARPU) is expected to decline faster on the consumer side than in the enterprise.
Juniper also looked at several distinct pricing scenarios and business models, finding that high end users of video, email and Web should all gravitate toward LTE services. Within the next half-decade, approximately one-fourth of all mobile service revenue will be generated by LTE services.
In related news, telecom giant Alcatel-Lucent announced this morning that it will be teaming up with Antel, a leading provider of communications services in Uruguay, to launch the first-ever commercial 4G/LTE wireless network in a Latin American country. ALU has now been selected by 18 service providers to help them deploy 4G LTE networks.
Beecher Tuttle is a MobilityTechzone contributor. He has extensive experience writing and editing for print publications and online news websites. He has specialized in a variety of industries, including health care technology, politics and education. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.
Edited by Jennifer Russell
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