LTE subscriptions in North America has soared to 22.3 million, a increase of almost 19 million in 12 months at the end of the 3Q 2012. This represents 51 percent of all 43.7 million LTE connections worldwide, reports 4G Americas. 128 commercial LTE networks have been launched in 58 countries to date.

While 3GPP technology subscriptions are expected to hit 6 billion mark, Informa predicts that LTE subscriptions will surpass 1 billion by the year 2018.

In North America, 19 commercial LTE networks have been launched to date, including Bell Mobility and Rogers Wireless in Canada and AT&T, MetroPCS, Sprint and Verizon with affiliates in the U.S. Informa forecasts 200+ million LTE connections by 2017.

In Latin America and Caribbean, 38 operators in 15 countries have committed to LTE deployment and 8 commercial LTE networks have been launched to date; in Brazil (Sky Telecom), Colombia (UNE), Mexico (Telcel), Dominican Republic (Orange), Puerto Rico (AT&T, Claro, Open Mobile) and Uruguay (Antel).