Spectrum key to growth: Nokia chief

Nokia's chairman and CEO Jorma Ollila gave a thumbs-up to Indian telecom policy yesterday, and said that 80 per cent of the mobile growth will come from countries such as India, Russia, Brazil and Indonesia. Of these countries, India is the fastest growing market in the world, he added.

Outlining the Nokia vision for a mobile world Ollila said, "Our vision "Life Goes Mobile" describes a world in which mobility has pervaded all facets of everyday life- be it private, professional or social. Tremendous opportunities enabled by the fast evolving digital convergence market are taking mobile communications industry to an exciting new growth phase." Ollila was speaking at the telecom summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industries.

On the Indian market, Ollila said he sees the increasing need for innovative concepts and technologies based on modular designs and open standards that will enable operators to expand their business sin a profitable way.

"In order to secure continued growth it is important to ensure that mobile operators in India have space for growth that there are no bottlenecks in the markets. This will mean ensuring spectrum availability," he said

On the issue of 3G networks, Ollila said it was important for India to achieve the same global volume and cost benefits apart from harmonising frequency allocation with the rest of the world to ensure seamless roaming.

The Nokia chairman and chief executive officer predicted that the global mobile data services will make up an increasingly large share of the market.

"Going forward we see data accounting for some 27 per cent of the total mobile service market in 2007 compared with 10 per cent in 2002. During the same period we foresee the mobile services market nearly doubling from last year to more than euro 600 billion."

Ollila said increasingly voice traffic is moving from fixed line to the mobile world. "For example in Itlay and Portugal already over 50 per cent of voice traffic is mobile. This means that for an increasing number of people a mobile will be the first and only phone as fixed network are beginning to be replaced." He said India is ideally positioned to leapfrog traditional networks into the mobile world.

Outlining Nokia's three pronged strategy in the new wireless world Ollila said, "We will expand mobile communications both in terms of volume and value, create new growth in fast growing markets and market segments as well as create new value through expanding to new areas."