Ericsson recently unveiled a glimpse of what the future of mobile Internet will bring, announcing its new M700 mobile platform, capable of LTE (Long Term Evolution) data transfer speeds. Ericsson says this is "the world's first commercially available LTE-capable platform", and we have no choice than to believe it, especially since the Swedish company sustains the platform will bring data transfer speeds of up to 50Mbps (when uploading) and up to 100Mbps (when downloading).

Sure, these speeds are not comparable with the ones achieved by NTT DoCoMo's Super 3G network (250Mbps), but they are obviously better than what the current 3G networks can offer. Moreover, these new speeds can surpass, in some cases, the data rates achieved by fixed lines, allowing the development of real-time mobile services, including video streaming and on-line gaming.

Although a commercial release for the new M700 platform is planned for 2009, the first devices to benefit from the advantages the platform brings will only be released in 2010. These devices include USB modems and ExpressCards for notebooks, laptop modems and various other modems that come in small form factors.

Ericsson's M700 platform supports bandwidths between 1.4MHz and 20MHz, and up to 6 frequencies (the 700 MHz one being included), hence being suited to work with most of the networks existent in the world. Ericsson developed a wide range of interfaces that will enable a quick and easy integration with the other existent mobile platforms, allowing the creation of "multi-mode devices".

Talking about the newly announced platform, Robert Puskaric, Head of Ericsson Mobile Platforms, declared: "This world-first launch marks a milestone in Ericsson's technology leadership and reflects our commitment to developing LTE as an evolutionary path. It is set to boost operators' service offering and provide consumers with a superior experience with full service broadband on any device, anywhere, at any time."