Ultimately, adding value as close to the customer as possible is not only inevitable but it is also going to be the critical criterion which determines which companies will survive.
Ericsson the Swedish manufacturer of telecommunications equipment has just passed a kind of milestone when its headcount in India has now exceeded the headcount at its headquarters in Sweden. This will be seen negatively in Sweden especially by the unions, but it is this readiness and ability to get close to the market which actually gives me confidence that they are on the right track. Ericsson, I think, have played this balancing act of changing roles at headquarters while growing close to the market rather well. (Which is why I have Ericsson in my portfolio).
Mobiletor: Ericsson which prides itself as a growing provider of communications technology and services, now has more employees in India than it does in its home country of Sweden, according to the company’s Facts & Figures web page. The headcount is 17,991 staff in India and 17,545 employees in Sweden, with about 80 percent of its workforce being male. In total, Ericsson has 111,383 employees from across the world working for it and has its headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden. …..
India is the fastest growing smartphone market on the globe and 4G LTE is still at its nascent stage, with few operators still appearing to be in the mood for testing the waters before diving right in. Going by an Ericsson report, the country’s mobile broadband users will grow in number to touch four times the present figures by the year 2020. This is directly tied to the 80 percent of consumers who still haven’t adopted smartphones and are yet to experience the mobileweb.
Ericsson have a fairly upbeat view of the mobile market in the latest Ericsson Mobility Report and their own prospects:
The number of mobile subscriptions worldwide grew approximately 7 percent year-on-year during Q1 2014. The number of mobile broadband subscriptions grew even faster over this period – at a rate of 35 percent year-on-year, reaching 2.3 billion. The amount of data usage per subscription also continued to grow steadily. Around 65 percent of all mobile phones sold in Q1 2014 were smartphones. Together, these factors have contributed to a 65 percent growth in mobile/cellular data traffic between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014.
By 2019, global mobile broadband subscriptions will exceed the world population.
Total mobile subscriptions are expected to grow from 6.8 billion in Q1 2014 to 9.2 billion by the end of 2019. Global mobile broadband subscriptions are predicted to reach 7.6 billion by 2019 and will gain an increasing share of the total mobile subscriptions over time.
Mobile broadband users in India will grow in numbers to reach four times the present figures by 2020. In 2013, people accessing data on their mobile devices reached 90 million. The smartphone penetration of 10% or 90 million devices will grow to 45% or 520 million mobile gadgets by 2020. The mobile subscriber base is expected to increase from 795 million last year to 1145 million by 2020.
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