Mobile networks market falls 12 pc

In that group, Siemens climbed its market share by one percentage point to 13 percent, one percentage point behind Nokia, Gartner wireless networks analyst Jason Chapman said.

‘‘Siemens have done well, particularly in (third generation) WCDMA systems (Wideband CDMA),’’ he said. In WCDMA alone, Siemens has 23 per cent of the market.

Overall, Chapman said 2003 had been a year of contraction without major moves between vendors. This year, a modest return to growth is expected as mobile telecoms operators have paid off debt and are forking out more money for network investments.

The growth is driven by investments in wider coverage of 3G networks. These networks, designed to bring voice, data, music, pictures and video to handsets, are starting to be used commercially this year.

Growth is also coming from continued investments in emerging markets where demand is still growing for second generation voice networks —— the number of mobile callers around the world is expected to climb to two billion within the next four years, from 1.3 billion now.

The seven top mobile infrastructure manufacturers announced a total of 267 contracts worldwide. Of those, 64 percent were for second generation GSM technology, 14 per cent for CDMA networks — used in the Americas and parts of Asia — and 14 per cent for third generation WCDMA infrastructure.