This is according to a new report 'LTE in Asia-Pacific: The Current Situation' from global research firm Ovum, part of the Datamonitor Group. Ovum says Polish mobile broadband operator Aero2 is due to turn on the world's first commercial TD-LTE system in early 2011.
Long-term evolution (LTE) is the newest mobile technology standard following on from GSM/EDGE and UMTS/HSxPA. It is developed by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), and trademarked by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute, one of the associations within the partnership,
Time Division Duplexing (TDD) is a transmission method that uses the same channel for the uplink and downlink (transmit and receive), but separates them by time slots. Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) uses separate channels for the uplink and downlink.
Ovum says while FDD LTE services were debuted in the Asia Pacific in late 2010, by Hong Kong's CSL and Japan's NTT DoCoMo, there has also been significant interest in TD-LTE outside of China.
In addition to China Mobile, Reliance Industries (RIL) looks set to deploy TD-LTE services in 2011 in India, the world's second-largest mobile market after China, giving a major boost to TD-LTE's global ambitions, the research house said in an announcement.
"TD-LTE services could also be launched in Malaysia, Japan, New Zealand, Australia and Taiwan," says Nicole McCormick, Ovum's senior analyst.
However, it is not just WiMAX operators that are considering TD-LTE, with Japanese mobile operator Softbank Mobile investigating the deployment of TD-LTE services alongside its FD-LTE services in high-demand areas.
"For FDD mobile operators, the most likely scenario for TD-LTE is that it is deployed for capacity offload," says McCormick.
For its part, China Mobile has pursued an international strategy for TD-LTE that will see smartphones released that accommodate both TDD and FDD services. Ovum said this will make the technology more attractive to operators looking to deploy TD-LTE services by opening up domestic and global roaming opportunities.
"But commercialisation of TD-LTE in China depends on when licences for 4G spectrum are issued, and the Chinese government has not indicated when this will occur," said McCormick. "In the past, the issuing of licences in China has been a slow and cumbersome process."
Ovum says China Mobile hopes to launch commercial TD-LTE services in 2012, with large-scale pre-commercials services penned to begin this year.