85 percent of all Swedes access 3G services. Foreign ICT innovative companies gather in Stockholm/Kista Wireless Valley.
Sweden offers foreign investors and entrepreneurs excellent ICT business opportunities thanks to its advanced research, strong clusters and open minded innovative companies.
Good examples are when Intel opened their first wireless centre outside California, the obvious choice was Stockholm/Kista Wireless Valley. Fast-growing Chinese telecom equipment manufacturers like ZTE and Huawei Technologies have also decided to exploit the availability of wireless know-how around Stockholm, Sweden’s strongest wireless competence area.
Sweden is an excellent reference market for companies with global ICT products and services. The fibre optic infrastructure is widely spread, with some 200 metro networks in more than 100 towns. Some 85 percent of Sweden's population can access 3G services, according to a report (January 05) by the Swedish National Post and Telecom Agency (PTS) . The figure gives Sweden the best population coverage in Europe. The construction of Sweden's 3G network has continued apace over the past year, meaning that the country is on course to achieve the aim of 100 percent population coverage within two years. The United Kingdom has the second most comprehensive network, which covers 75 percent of the country's inhabitants. Italy came third in the rankings.
The WCDMA third-generation mobile technology, now being upgraded into HSDPA, was largely developed by Ericsson and Telia Sonera in Sweden, as well as the earlier wireless technologies NMT, GSM, GPRS and EDGE as well as Bluetooth. Other innovative wireless and broadband companies are i3micro, Swe-dish, Net Insight, Posio, Repeatit, Packetfront, Transmode, Wavium and Xelerated. Swedish companies like Drutt, Visual Wireless, Operax, Mobilaris, Hotsip and IpUnplugged, also develop unique solutions for operators in mediation, billing, collection, gateways and Value Added Services.
For further information:
www.pts.se - Swedish National Post and Telecom Agency (PTS)
www.investsweden.se - Invest Sweden
