Sweden's mobile network giant Ericsson said today it posted increased sales and a sharply boosted net profit thanks to mobile broadband sales, although its earnings slightly missed expectations.
Ericsson, the world's biggest mobile network maker, saw its fourth quarter sales grow 8% to 62.8 billion kronor (€7 billion), largely above the 2% hike expected by analysts.
Ericsson CEO Hans Vestberg explained the strong recovery of sales was 'mainly driven by a strong development in mobile broadband' in the fourth quarter after a largely disappointing 2010.
'Mobile data traffic is forecasted to almost double annually over the coming years,' he added.
The company's net profit attributable to shareholders was of 4.32 billion kroner against only 314 million the same time a year earlier, but was slightly below analysts' expectations of 4.84 billion kronor.
For all of 2010, the company's net profit increased threefold to 11.15 billion kroner, compared to 3.67 billion a year earlier, when earnings were dragged down by heavy restructuring costs.
Sales in 2010 decreased 2% to 203.3 billion kronor compared to a year earlier, dragged down by a sluggish economic context and a component shortage problem. The company said sales growth returned in the second half of the year.
Ericsson has 90,000 employees and is the market leader in mobile network equipment ahead of Finnish-German giant Nokia Siemens, French-based telecom equipment maker Alcatel-Lucent and China's Huawei.
