Ericsson Retains Its Crown – Barely

Ericsson AB is still king of the telecom network infrastructure vendors but only by the narrowest of margins.

The Swedish vendor today announced full-year 2012 revenues of 227.8 billion Swedish kronor (US$35.84 billion), just ahead of the 220.2 billion yuan renminbi ($35.4 billion) generated by Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. last year. (See Ericsson Spies Networks Payoff and Huawei Expects 10%+ Growth in 2013.)

The Chinese company might be top of the pile by the end of this year, though, if it can achieve its predicted 10 percent sales growth.

By contrast, Nokia Siemens Networks has just reported 2012 revenues of €13.78 billion ($18.43 million). (See Has NSN Turned a Corner?)

Alcatel-Lucent reports its fourth-quarter and full-year numbers on Feb. 7 but will not be troubling Ericsson and Huawei at the top of the sales leaderboard: Instead it will be battling NSN for third place.

— Ray Le Maistre, International Managing Editor, Light Reading