About 750 million of the world's two billion GSM subscribers are located in the Asia-Pacific region, which also accounts for nearly 30 percent of the world's subscriber growth. In the near future, one billion subscribers are expected to come from this part of the world.

The Southeast-Asian market, in focus at CommunicAsia, includes a dynamic mix of advanced, mature, and developing markets.

Ericsson has been conducting a series of seminars at CommunicAsia to address the diverse issues operators are facing in this region. The seminars focused on topics that are at the top of the operators' agendas, including how to profitably address low-spending subscribers, how to make a success of 3G, and how to efficiently evolve to all-IP.

Ericsson also took the opportunity to highlight its strengthened position in broadband with its acquisition of Marconi. The company also held three mini-seminars at its pavilion in the expo grounds on the subjects of maximizing service uptake, IMS-enabled solutions, and opportunities with GSM and WCDMA.

Alina Tengku Ibrahim, Ericsson, Southeast Asia, says, "The response to these seminars was overwhelming. We understand that the bulk of new users will come from Asia over the next few years and many of them will have a low spending potential for communications services."

At CommunicAsia, Ericsson showed how operators can build networks with lower costs of ownership that are still able to accommodate future technologies and growth.  Ericsson's Expander solution for rural markets is one example.

Ericsson was also keen to prove to operators in the region that it is the partner for progress. However, the company has faced challenges in growing its market share in Southeast Asia as major infrastructure investments there are still largely driven by price. "We have seen some competitors cut prices drastically merely as a means to gain market share," Tengku Ibrahim says. 

There is a lot of momentum in the region that Ericsson is well positioned for. "3G is picking up in Southeast Asia," Tengku Ibrahim says. The market includes multiple regions in different stages of development.

For example, in the urban areas of Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines, operators have upgraded or are presently upgrading their networks to WCDMA or HSPA.

However, in developing markets such as Bangladesh and Vietnam, as well as in the non-urban areas of Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines, they are still building and rolling out 2G networks, with some evolving to GPRS and EDGE.

The interest from customers at this year's event will most likely keep Ericsson coming back to CommunicAsia.

As Tengku Ibrahim says: "It is a good opportunity to show the Southeast-Asian market that not only is Ericsson the true end-to-end solutions provider, which is driving the growth of the industry, but that we are also focused on developing solutions that help drive operator profitability and future growth.".