ZTE was the fastest growing telecom equipment maker and solutions provider in 2008, according to a report by research firm IDC. The report was based on 2008 earnings.
Driving the growth is the company’s wireless business, which grew 20 per cent year-over-year.
This part of ZTE’s operations, which includes sales of infrastructure, handsets, software and services and other wireless-related items, amounted to 38.5 per cent of the company’s total revenues.
ZTE’s full year net profit jumped by 32.5 per cent to USD $239 million and revenue rose 27.4 per cent to USD $6.4 billion.
The company has made it clear it intends to push deeper into the US handset market – currently the company currently sells phones mainly through MetroPCS – but it has still to sign many infrastructure deals.
Its Chinese counterpart, however, the privately held Huawei, has made progress in that area.
Huawei won a contract to provide the infrastructure for Cox Communications’ 3G CDMA network and is reportedly one of the three infrastructure companies AT&T has short-listed for its trial of LTE technology.
Yin Yimin, president of ZTE Corporation, said the IDC result showed ZTE’s commitment to spearheading R&D initiatives, coupled with its determination to innovate and introduce high quality telecom equipment solutions, is paying off.
"With a strong global workforce ready to provide the best technical support to our customers, we believe ZTE will remain a key player in the highly competitive telecom market in the years ahead," he said.
