LTE is a 4G technology with very Higher data speeds as the obvious advantage.

In the United States, for customers, potential VoLTE advantages include fast call set-up times and better (HD) voice quality for LTE-to-LTE calls (yet another positive feature of Verizon’s new pricing, which has strong incentives to create family user groups).

Wherever carriers are able to build near-ubiquitous LTE coverage quickly (e.g. in South Korea, Verizon Wireless), they should be able to launch voice over LTE (VoLTE) this year. Carriers who lack the capital or spectrum for a rapid LTE network build-out will have to wait for VoLTE to support call hand-offs to 3G.

4G LTE can in some cases help carriers differentiate their offerings and preserve pricing power, thanks to spectrum fragmentation and scarcity. Traffic growth should step up with video over LTE, just as smartphone penetration starts to level off in leading markets. Convergence and TV content relationships are also creeping into the market structure equation.