Mobile telecom equipment maker Ericsson reported stronger-than-expected third-quarter sales figures Thursday, boosted primarily by high activity levels in North America.

In posting its third consecutive quarter of progress toward reaching its 2020 financial targets, the company saw its net sales jump by 9 percent year-on-year and 8 percent since the last quarter.

"We continued execution on our focused strategy that we laid out a year-and-a-half ago, and it is starting to yield the results," Borje Ekholm, president and CEO of Ericsson, told CNBC's "Street Signs" Thursday.

"It is still not good enough, we can do better. And that is why we are well on the way to reach the targets for 2020," Ekholm said.

The mobile telecom provider posted an operating profit of 3.2 billion crowns ($356.5 million) as compared to a loss of 3.7 billion crowns in the third quarter of 2017.