"Confidence is back in the industry; we are seeing an increased focus on business development and revenue growth," said Svanberg, reiterating the market outlook that was given in the third quarter report. "The temporary catch up effect inflates the total mobile systems market growth in 2004. Therefore, compared to total growth in 2004, we expect the global market for mobile systems to show slight growth in 2005. Excluding this catch up effect in 2004, we estimate a moderate underlying market growth in 2005."

"Only a few companies can deliver the end-to-end solutions required in a changing communications landscape. Ericsson has the combined strength of systems and services, handsets from Sony Ericsson and core handset technology from Ericsson Mobile Platforms," said Svanberg.

Consumers demand services that are easy to use, reliable and secure regardless of device and access method. Ericsson offers its customers true end-to-end capabilities required in a changing communications landscape where consumer convenience is the key driver.

Svanberg highlighted mobile broadband as a very attractive business opportunity for operators. "Ericsson believes the combination of growing demand for broadband access, strong growth of laptop penetration and increasingly pervasive coverage of mobile networks is fast developing into a new and growing telecom service - mobile broadband," said Svanberg.

Svanberg emphasized that the United States is Ericsson's largest market.

"We have a strong position in the United States, five of the largest wireless operators are Ericsson customers. We see new business opportunities in services, particularly in managed services, but also in new federal government business," said Svanberg.

Mobile broadband offers bandwidths similar to what DSL and cable offer today - but with the added advantage of being wireless, and accessible on the move. It enables you to work anywhere, makes staying in touch more simple and easy to manage.

Svanberg underlined the importance of true end-to-end capabilities when operators increasingly are focusing on providing new services to their customers, combining voice, data, images and video to offer maximum consumer convenience.

Svanberg also pointed out the importance of telecom grade expertise to guarantee consumer convenience and that IMS is a cornerstone in enabling converged consumer services.

"The evolution to all-IP service delivery is a natural step for both fixed and mobile communications. The challenge for operators today is how to deliver IP services without sacrificing real-time performance. Ericsson's IMS solution has been specifically designed to offer both fixed and mobile operators a smooth path to all-IP operations," said Carl-Henric Svanberg.

 

 

Ola Rembe, Ericsson, Group Functions Communications

Phone: +46 730 24 48 73

E-mail: press.relations@ericsson.com

Kathy Egan, Vice President Communications, Ericsson Inc.

Phone: +1 212 843 8422

E-mail: pressrelations@ericsson.com