TeliaSonera’s mobile broadband commercial network in Stockholm is now the fastest and largest in the world. Carl-Henric Svanberg, President and CEO of Ericsson is excited about this historical moment. “The new era of mobile broadband has just begun today. With LTE, so-called 4G, your mobile broadband experience is moving to unequalled levels. The LTE speed gives you an absolutely effortless feeling of broadband access.”

LTE, the next generation mobile communication technology, is designed for transferring huge amounts of data in a most cost and energy efficient way, optimizing use of frequency band and realizing fiber-like access speed over the air. With decreased latency, consumers can now enjoy whatever service is available online: HD video, network games, you name it – effortlessly on the move.

Kenneth Karlberg, President and Head of Mobility Services, TeliaSonera says: “We are very proud to be the first operator in the world to offer our customers 4G services. Thanks to the successful cooperation with Ericsson we can offer 4G to our customers in Stockholm earlier than originally planned.”

Downtown Stockholm is covered with the Ericsson LTE network, making it the largest LTE deployment to date. TeliaSonera’s customers are the first to have access to the LTE service by commercially available Samsung LTE dongles.

Ericsson has completed commercialization of its LTE products and larger production is ready for further deployment. Interoperability is tested thoroughly with many different devices in different operators’ networks.

Ericsson

The appointment of Pinkham follows Ericsson’s significantly strengthened position in the North American market. The Nortel acquisition, along with important breakthrough contract wins for Ericsson in North America and the recently announced relocation of Ericsson’s Chief Technology Officer Håkan Eriksson from Stockholm to Silicon Valley, positions Ericsson as the leading provider of telecommunications technology and services in the United States and Canada. Ericsson has almost tripled the number of employees in North America from the beginning of 2009 and now has some 14,500 employees. In terms of sales, North America will now be Ericsson’s largest region.

Pinkham’s appointment to the newly established position of Vice President, Corporate Affairs and Communications in North America, reflects the focus on enhancing communication with key important stakeholders such as media, industry associations, investors, regulators, legislators and analysts.

Pinkham has more than 30 years of experience in the telecommunications industry of which he spent the past 20 years with Ericsson in various key positions. Most recently he advised Ericsson’s Executive Management with regards to investor and analyst relations. He will be based in Washington DC.

“As the largest supplier of technology and services to network operators worldwide, Ericsson is a key partner for increasing broadband penetration for the associated societal and economic benefits,” said Angel Ruiz, head of Ericsson’s North American operations. “Gary Pinkham has a broad and unique blend of telecom and business experience to share with this group of influential constituencies.”

“I am looking forward to working collaboratively with industry stakeholders and government leaders to discuss a wide variety of industry and technology topics, such as broadband, spectrum and ICT sustainability initiatives,” said Pinkham.

Corporate communications for business media, investors and industry analysts in North America will be covered from New York while government and industry affairs will be addressed from Washington, DC.

Ericsson

More than 30,000 people in 175 Amazon villages will get access to e-health and e-education services through mobile broadband. Ericsson and Vivo are part of a group that will bring mobile broadband connectivity to the Amazonian state of Pará in Brazil.

With more than 5 million sq km, the Amazon represents over half of the planet’s remaining rainforests and comprises the largest biodiversity on the planet.

Among other applications, the project will implement the mobile survey tool that will be used to monitor environmental impacts, diagnose patients, facilitate communication with the communities, and run studies to monitor the life quality index.

Roberto Lima, President of Vivo, Brazil’s largest operator, says: “We believe and are working to show that a connected Brazil can do more. This is our motto and a partnership like this reinforces our commitment in attending to and understanding Brazil’s development. We will create a learning network through the use of mobile devices to build local educational setup, and to also exchange information.”

A recent research by Deloitte shows that a 10 percent increase in mobile penetration leads to a 1.2 percent increase in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in developing countries.

Fatima Raimondi, President of Ericsson Brazil, says: “Mobile communications play an important role in helping communities to develop on a sustainable basis. Working in partnership means we can achieve things we wouldn’t be able to do alone.”

Under the scope of the project, Vivo will operate and maintain the infrastructure. The Vivo Institute will develop methodologies and practices for network learning, spreading the opportunities offered by the project. Ericsson will develop and implement the necessary solutions, services and applications for the project. The Saúde & Alegria project will offer local support and will be responsible for training communities, giving guidelines for the use of the application. During the first phase of the project 15 communities will be covered.

The initiative also includes Sony Ericsson, the government of Belterra, CPqD (Brazilian research institute for telecom and IT companies) and the Albert Einstein Hospital, among others.

Ericsson

Abdulkhalek Ashuor, General Manager of Al-Madar Al-Jadid, says: “We’ve worked with Ericsson since 1995 and we trust that their competence in the revenue-management area and experience of delivering complex convergent charging and billing projects will allow us to enhance our service offering to our customers at an efficient cost and with faster time to market. We are looking forward to introducing this new and flexible platform”.

Rafiah Ibrahim, President of Ericsson in Northern Africa, says: “Ericsson’s innovative solution enables service providers to control their revenue streams. Millions of subscribers are charged and billed through our solutions and now we are delighted that Libyan users will benefit as well.”

Through this convergent charging and billing solution, the operator is able to offer seamless services across all end-user segments, something that was not possible with previous billing systems.
The solution provides a single revenue management solution for all subscribers and services and includes key features such as discount and promotion handling, real-time rating, segmentation, pricing and promotions.

For consumers and business users, convergent charging and billing provides full control over all communications costs as users have one point of contact and a single invoice for all their services and gives users access to the services they want independent of their subscription type, as well as the ability to pay however they choose. Convergent charging and billing provides end-users with real-time information on their spending and credit level, so that they will never spend more than they intend to. End users can also be kept fully update on their bundled minutes, bonuses and rewards.

This is a one-year contract and Al-Madar Al-Jadid is expected to launch the new services in 2010.

Ericsson

18,5 million users in eight countries to get higher speed and improved services

Microwave solution increases capacity and reduces costs

Mobile phone subscribers are doing an increasing amount with their handsets, and Telekom Austria Group is expecting a significant increase in capacity demands; data traffic in Austria alone has increased fivefold over the past two years. To meet these demands, all Telekom Austria Group companies in eight European countries are, besides other innovative technologies, upgrading their mobile networks with Ericsson’s latest, microwave solution, which enables increased capacity while reducing costs for mobile operators.

Johann Pichler, Group CTO of mobilkom austria group, says: “To guarantee that our customers can enjoy the benefits of mobile broadband and take advantage of new possibilities in the future, the work to smoothly upgrade our networks needs to begin today. Ericsson’s highly cost-effective solution helps us meet our objective of having a complete mobile broadband offering.”

Roland Nordgren, Head of Ericsson Central Europe and President of Ericsson Austria, says: “Demand is increasing fast in Central Europe, and now 18.5 million user in eight countries will get higher speed and improved services. In addition, we are also reducing costs for our operator customers with our sustainable, cost-effective solutions.”

The Telekom Austria Group will upgrade its networks in Austria, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Macedonia, Liechtenstein, Serbia and Slovenia, according to market needs. Rollout has already started, which includes an IP-based microwave transmission network, a management system and related integration and support services.

Ericsson and Telekom Austria Group have been working together for more than 10 years, achieving several breakthroughs in commercial launches of mobile broadband technologies in Europe.

Ericsson