ZTE-Mobitel in $ 50 m agreement

by Mohammed Naalir

ZTE Corporation, a publicly-listed global provider of telecommunication equipment and network solutions, said it signed a strategic cooperation agreement worth $50 m with Mobitel.

The agreement was signed in the presence of Chairman of the Standing Committee of the Chinese National People's Congress, Wu Bangguo and President Mahinda Rajapaksa during Wu's recent visit to Sri Lanka.

According to the agreement, ZTE will deploy over 700, 2G/3G/4G LTE base stations and transmission equipment for Mobitel's Stage VII mobile network expansion project. Upon completion of the project, it will be South Asia's first commercial 4G (FDD-LTE) network.

ZTE became the major telecommunication equipment supplier for Mobitel after the successful completion of the Stage VI mobile network expansion project in June 2012, the largest expansion project in the Sri Lankan telecommunications sector.

"We are happy that ZTE had helped us to successfully complete the largest stage of our network expansion in June this year, which involved the setting up of over 1,000, 2G and 3G base stations in record time," said CEO of Mobitel, Lalith de Silva.