In-Stat: 3G Market Entering Refinement Period

According to a new report from In-Stat, "cellular operators continued to steadily roll out new 3G systems in 2005, though the rate of new deployments has slowed. In 2005, 35 new WCDMA systems were deployed, as well as 7 new CDMA2000 1X EV-DO systems."

Allen Nogee at In-Stat said, "Most carriers have deployed at least their first attempt at 3G; they see WiMax on the horizon, and they slowly have been embracing WiFi. For the most part, carriers will take a breather over these next few years and refine the networks they already have, while developing new features to make use of those networks. Carriers have spent billions of dollars to deploy 3G, but future strategy will be geared towards how to best utilize these networks.”

Key report finding include:

• The worldwide 3G subscriber base will grow from 29.1 million in 2004 to 540 million in 2010.
• HSDPA has very strong traction among WCDMA carriers, and most are planning to or are in the process of upgrading to it.