The worldwide LTE subscriber base surged nearly fivefold sequentially in the June quarter, according to recent estimates.
Maravedis estimates that LTE customer numbers grew 478% quarter-on-quarter in Q2. By the end of the June, 20 operators had commercially launched the FDD variant of LTE.
A total of 177 operators had committed to this variant, a further 21 had committed to TD-LTE, and four operators had trialled both standards.
Maravidis estimates that TD-LTE subscriber uptake will begin in 2013, after Asian operators including China Mobile roll out services. Growth in TD-LTE will be driven by the region.
Analyst Fernando Donoso said on the vendor side it is shaping up to be a three-horse race between Huawei, NSN and Ericsson as to who takes the most LTE deals.
“We look to NSN, and particularly Huawei, to improve their standing in the mobile wireless market as they convert LTE contracts into network deployments," he said.
By contrast, Wimax subscribers were calculated to have grown just 14% in the quarter, but Maravedis still expects the BWA/Wimax subscriber base to reach 28.6 million by the end of next year.