Swedes have mobile explosion with 4G

In December 2008 Sony Ericsson signed an agreement with Vodafone to build their 4G network swedenwith LTE (Long Term Evolution) technology.

- "After having been in the forefront in the IT world, we felt that Sweden fell behind in the telecommunications front, so we thought of what might get Sweden back on the map," said Mikael Bäckström, when he spoke at the Mobile Future conference.

- "Now we see that Sweden may become the world's first country with LTE network. We expect to launch 4G in 2010. Perhaps in the early years, but not before we feel ready, "said Erik Hallberg, who is Head of Mobility Services at TeliaSonera in Sweden.

A precondition for the launch, is the need to find products that can be connected to the network. Erik Hallberg shows a series of LTE modems from Samsung. The modem is slightly larger than an ordinary 3G modem, but only a bit.

"The new generation of mobile networks, 4G, which is able to deliver speeds up to 40 Mbit / s, opening up new customers. It's not just people who wish to communicate faster. We will also see an explosion of things that are connected wirelessly - for example. cars, household equipment, navigation equipment, games and cameras, "noted Mikael Bäckström.

"Today we have five million SIM card users in Sweden. In ten years, we anticipate that the figure has risen to between 200 and 250 million connections," explained Erik Hallberg.

New services
Neither Erik Hallberg Mikael Bäckström, or believe in any "killer app" that will drive the process. There will be new players with entirely new services that nobody can predict today. But Erik Hallberg, however, one last cautious comment:

"For everything to work, we need to invest in new transport. If we fail to see return on investment, we will not invest more in infrastructure. This is not a threat but a reality. It may also be possible to pay us to disseminate the new technology. "

For the sake we had better mention that LTE technology in principle can not officially go under the concept of 4G. This is an evolution of current 3G networks, and the correct name for one, will be 3.9G.