The Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) has said LTE and LTE-Advanced connections skyrocketed by 156 million connections in the fourth quarter of 2015. In the last year, LTE connections went up by 552.2 million.
Alan Hadden, VP of research at GSA said, "A daily average of almost 1.7 million LTE subscriptions were being signed up during Q4 2015 and the rate of LTE subscriptions growth is accelerating. LTE technology is now being used by one in seven mobile subscriptions worldwide."
According to Telecoms.com, China is the "dominant market" globally, registering the largest number of LTE subscriptions. They went from 84 million to 386 million subscribers.
The GSA said the amount of global networks offering LTE - which would be 116 operators - will only grow from here on out and reported that 24% of the world's operators are currently facilitating LTE-A connections. According to ITWeb.co.za, 57 countries are using LTE-A, which the GSA says will change soon, they expect 100% global penetration.
There is no denying that LTE and LTE-A give users all over the world a faster connection to the internet but if the networks become over saturated with users, will it slow the networks down? For now, it is a viable technology that is allowing more than a billion people to access the internet and at good upload and download speeds.
TELECOMS
