Ericsson Aims To Be One Of Top Two Handset Suppliers
STOCKHOLM (Dow Jones)--LM Ericsson AB's (ERICY) new T28 cellular handset is very competitive and should increase the telecommunication group's market share, the company's Chief Executive Sven-Christer Nilsson told an analysts' meeting Thursday.
"Our aim is to be among the top two suppliers of handsets, and we will launch a number of new phones on the T28 platform later this year," he said.
Ericsson is the third-largest cellular handset supplier after Nokia Oy of Finland (NOKA) and Motorola Inc. of the U.S. (MOT).
Nilsson also acknowledged that the recent alliance between Cisco Systems (CSCO) and Motorola will heat up competition in the datacommunications sector, but said Ericsson has good products of its own in the pipeline for wireless data communication.
He said Ericsson wasn't really interested in acquiring either Bay Networks, which was bought by Northern Telecom (NT), or Ascend Communications, which was recently taken over by Lucent Technologies (LU).
Ericsson's main focus is the broader market for wireless Internet protocol data communication, through third-generation broad band wireless communication.
"That is a market that doesn't yet exist but I believe we will be well positioned when it really takes off in a few years," he said.
He said the recent order from British Telecom for an Asynchronous Transfer Mode, or ATM, was a good example of how to bridge the transfer from traditional voice telephony to Internet-protocol based communication.
-By Jan Lindroth; +46-8-5451 3091
|
