LTE subscribers to hit 430m by 2016

But these high speed mobile subs will still only be six per cent of the world's connections.

Juniper Research says the real growth for LTE (that's 4G in the vernacular) will start next year, especially now that operators and network infrastructure specialists are committing to the tech.

It says the total number of LTE base station deployments will reach almost 1 million by 2014.

In the early years LTE will be all about the enterprise, but consumers will overtake enterprise subscribers by 2015.

It also projected that smartphones and tablets will dominate the LTE device market, accounting for 50 per cent of all total LTE subscribers by 2016. 

Report author Nitin Bhas said: "With LTE being offered as a premium level service initially, enterprise subscribers will be attracted by the improved data speeds and the service guarantees that will be offered. The emerging factor that will drive consumer take-up later in the forecast and beyond is the embedding of LTE technology in consumer devices."