Brainstorm Tech 2014 kicked off with a conversation between Fortune’s Michal Lev-Ram and Hans Vestberg, CEO of Ericsson. Ericsson, a supplier of networking and communications infrastructure, has made its mark in wireless by developing faster mobile data speeds. Ericsson has even had successful recent experiments in 5G speeds, but today Vestberg took a step back to talk about what might seem like ancient history: 2G speeds.
《财富》专栏作家迈克尔·列弗·拉姆与爱立信（Ericsson）首席执行官卫翰思的对话拉开了“2014年科技头脑风暴大会”的帷幕。爱立信是网络和通讯基础设备供应商，它开发的快速无线移动通讯网络得到业界广泛认可。最近爱立信的试验成功达到了5G网速，但在这次对话中，卫翰思却后退一步，谈到了似乎早就已经成为历史的2G网速。
As companies continue to update their mobile applications for faster data speeds, Ericsson has decided to partner with Internet companies to help applications stay accessible for non-4G speed customers in emerging markets. So far, Ericsson has held an innovation lab with Facebook FB 2.35% with the goal to get more than 1 billion new people from emerging markets online using Facebook’s services on connected devices.
现在为了适应更快的数据传输速度，各家公司都在不断更新移动应用程序。爱立信公司决意与互联网企业携手，保障4G网络尚未覆盖的新兴市场客户也能使用这些应用程序。迄今为止，爱立信已经与Facebook合作创建了一所创新实验室，争取未来能有超过10亿的新兴市场用户可以在联网设备上使用Facebook应用程序。
Ericsson has the incentive to slow things down.”We have the global scale,” said Vestberg, “but not everyone has 4G in the world. In fact, only about 200 million people have 4G.” Vestberg predicts that the next billion people will come online in mobile-centric emerging markets within the next five years, and they will need applications that can work in non-4G areas on Ericsson’s mobile networks. Ericsson is also facing major competition from Chinese company Huawei to get more people using mobile networks. Ericsson, which operates in more than 180 countries, is in a race to scale even larger.
爱立信放慢节奏背后自然有它的动机。“虽然我们有全球化的规模，”卫翰思说。“但是并不是世界上所有地方都覆盖了4G网络。事实上，全球只有2亿4G用户。”卫翰思预测未来五年内，以移动为中心的新兴市场中会有10亿左右新用户入网。他们需要的是在没有4G网络的环境下也能够爱立信移动网络中运行的应用程序。爱立信现在正努力吸引更多用户使用移动网络，而它最大的竞争对手是中国企业华为。爱立信的业务遍布180多个国家，它仍然在争取更大的市场份额。
“We need to understand what innovation will be built on top of our networks,” said Vestberg, who wants to continue to partner with Internet companies to make mobile technology accessible. “Enormous scale can transform a lot in our society.”
“我们必须明白，以现有的网络为基础，我们还能有什么创新”，卫翰思计划继续携手互联网企业，让更多的用户使用移动技术。他说：“在我们的社会中，巨大的规模能改变很多。”