unite: Trends and insights 2009

Between now and 2015, we see both voice and data traffic growing at an extraordinary rate, with mobile data traffic growing some 300-fold. Last year alone, we saw a 5-fold increase in data traffic across our customer base. However, there will also be much slower subscriber growth – the 20 percent annual subscription growth witnessed over the last decade is well and truly behind us.

Over the course of the next five years, our customers will spend a significant amount deploying LTE networks and the supporting infrastructure required for sustainable mobile broadband services. When added to the 3G-HSPA investment our industry has made in recent years and will continue to make well into the future, this adds up to an enormous investment. Given this, the sector needs to work more closely than ever before to ensure the business case is there to support these major investments

At the same time, we are all searching for, and finding, new ways to drive efficiency. We believe this trend will accelerate in the coming years.

These two factors – the need for constant investment and the need to boost efficiency– require all stakeholders to work together, finding innovative solutions that make good business sense.

Many of us – particularly those of us who have grown up in this sector – tend to think within the confines of our own vertical structures – infrastructure vendors, device manufacturers and operators – and frankly, we’ve not worked that well together.

Times now demand that we change our behavior.

At Nokia Siemens Networks, we are passionate about playing a key role in building a healthy future for the sector as a whole. The pages of this annual capture insights into the key trends affecting each and every one; it’s a time for collaboration if we are to meet the challenges now facing our industry.

Rajeev Suri
Chief Executive Officer