14 DAY TRIAL // Ericsson announced on Wednesday the signing of its first Long Term Evolution (LTE) agreement. The new deal shows that the licensing of the company's technology will play an important role in its strategy for moving forward at a time when the adoption of LTE is increasing all around the world. A wide range of companies already announced support for LTE, while a recent report pointed towards 12 carriers that would deploy networks based on this 4G technology in the following few years.
According to Reuters, Gustav Brismark, Ericsson's vice president of patent strategies at Ericsson, stated that the company had more than 80 similar patent agreements for the GSM and W-CDMA technologies. “The first agreements including LTE have been signed, and over time more or less all these agreements will be renegotiated to include LTE, but that will not be done in a day,” Brismark is reported to have said.
At the same time, he added that Ericsson would continue to invest in research and development, while also licensing the technologies it comes to the market with. It seems that the infrastructure provider is seeking to maintain its leading position on the market while the telecommunications area moves from GSM and W-CDMA to LTE. “That is important to be able to continue the strategy of having license revenues as one part of what Ericsson makes money from,” he said.
As many of you might already know, Ericsson is one of the key proponents of LTE. The company announced in May, together with TeliaSonera, the launch of the world's first commercial Long Term Evolution site in Stockholm, Sweden. Ericsson is one of the vendors selected to build the infrastructure for Verizon Wireless' LTE network, which is expected to be commercially launched in 20 to 30 markets next year. According to ABI research, ten carriers should roll out LTE networks next year, offering access to the technology to more than 34 million people by 2011.