Huawei has surpassed Ericsson and Nokia to emerge as top European LTE base station equipment supplier in 2011.

The Chinese equipment maker rose from half the number of European LTE base station deployments as Ericsson in 2010 to its European competitors.

According to NPD In-Stat.Ericsson and Nokia Siemens Networks will grab second and third spots respectively in the market in 2011. With 90 percent the trio dominate the  LTE base station equipment market.

Samsung is far behind the top three with less than 1 percent share in European LTE base station equipment market in 2011. The company was expected to lead the Asia Pacific region.

"Success in a region is less about the region and more about the success with individual carriers, especially the large carriers. Almost of half of Huawei''s 2011 LTE base station success for example was the result of Huawei's work with Vodafone in Germany," says Chris Kissel, Senior Analyst.

"The market is far from static though. Alcatel-Lucent and ZTE promise to grab share in the future. Additionally, 16% of deployments in 2015 have yet to have a LTE equipment vendor selected."

But the good news for Nokia Siemens Networks is that it has been  projected to lead the pack the European LTE base station equipment market in 2015 with Nokia Ericsson expected to emerge as top player in Eastern Europe.

In 2011, Ericsson, Huawei, and Alcatel-Lucent have demonstrably similar shares of the Western European LTE base station equipment market. In Eastern Europe, however, Huawei accounts for almost half the market.

By 2015, there will be over 400 thousand LTE POPs in European countries. From 2009 to 2015, the Western European LTE Packet Backhaul equipment investment by operators will account for over US$2 billion in revenue.