Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s top smartphone maker, said Wednesday it plans to roll out a smartphone that runs on the fourth-generation long-term evolution for the first time in the Russian market.

The Galaxy S3 LTE is scheduled to go on sale starting on Dec. 10 in 17 major cities via MegaFon, Russia’s second-largest mobile carrier, Samsung said in a press release.

MegaFon, which first introduced a commercial LTE service in Russia in May, has been moving to set up a network for the fastest mobile network.

“The Galaxy S3 LTE model is one of the most interesting devices this year,” MegaFon executive Mikhail Zolotovitskii was quoted as saying in Samsung’s Korean-language press release.

The upcoming release is set to expand Samsung’s LTE reach to 29 countries. Samsung supplies LTE-backed handsets and tablet computers to major markets in Asia, Europe and the United States. (Yonhap News)