Global Recession Can't Slow Down Mobile Technology Growth

At the Mobile World Congress gathering in Barcelona, Spain, communication giant executives discussed the future of the telecommunications industry in light of a global economic recession. Their conclusion? On the whole, things aren’t slowing down. In fact, handset-making juggernaut Nokia, based in Finland, plans to increase its investment in what has traditionally been a poor U.S. market. Is Nokia the exception?

Sweden-based Ericsson CEO Carl-Henric Svanberg stated, “It would be unrealistic to believe that, in the worst slowdown in many, many years, the telecom sector would not be affected.” However, in light of this, while his company still plans to cut costs overall, there remains moves to invest more in technology such as remote mobile base stations based on wind and solar power.

Furthermore, the recession could spark a new period of cooperation between mobile phone giants. Services that phone companies have previously tried to monopolize will attempt to collaborate and share costs, which should be effective for many phone companies.

One thing is for sure: Cell phone growth isn’t slowing down! Despite the economic crunch, increased affordability as well as the peculiar trend of cell phones to be an inferior good seem to indicate that, while taking a dose of caution is necessary, cell phone giants should continue to flourish.

Read more about the growth of the mobile technology sector on Businessweek!