g enough money to tide over the investments made and hence start seeing profits. Businesses cannot expect to see any real profits until the ROI period is accomplished. The key challenge with LTE network rollouts for the operator will be generating enough revenue from the services to the users to be able to have a high enough ARPU so that the ROI period is low enough to sustain interest of the investors and creditors. This is a pretty difficult task! For the proliferation of flat rate plans for a fixed capacity offering (in terms of gigabytes), you have to take away the ability of operators to specialize their offering as a premium service. It has long been the case that call rates for voice services are being pushed down due to competition and pressure from market regulators linked to the government. Even roaming offerings are no longer able to generate revenue as agencies are trying to minimize the impact on consumers as much as possible. So, operators are forced to innovate and differentiate their offerings and services enough so users are ready to pay a premium price or top dollar for their services. Also, as the focus moves more to the content that users can use, operators need to work with content providers so they don't lose any more relevance as meaningful players who can offer services and make real money in doing SO. CHAPTER 3 DEPLOYMENT CHALLENGES IN EVOLVING 4G The recent trends for major telecommunication providers indicate the following concerns in profitability as seen in operating the business landscape: Earnings indicators like EBITDA have been falling for the past two years. Returns on capital employed are also showing a downward trend. Voice revenues continue to fall even while mobile broadband picks up pace. The Changing Marketplace As discussed previously, the investments being made and the services being offered with some specific targets in mind can be made by the operator, keeping in mind certain assumptions about user behavior and applications that are targeted. In the event that the marke