ZTE Wins Indian GSM Network Contract

China's ZTE has won a US$400 million GSM expansion contract from India's Aircel - a subsidiary of Malaysia's Maxis. Aircel is currently operating in 10 telecom circles (Assam, Bihar, Chennai, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Calcutta, North East, Orissa, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal) and with licences secured for the remaining 13 of the 23 telecom circles.

It is a great opportunity for us to be selected by Maxis to help enhance the GSM network of its subsidiary in India, one of the fastest growing telecom markets in East Asia. This agreement has given ZTE a valuable opportunity to contribute our strong expertise and technology to develop GSM infrastructure in the local market, said ZTE executive. We have been successful in sustaining the strong growth of our wireless business portfolio over the past three quarters. Today, we ranked fourth globally in terms of GSM equipment shipment, while we continue a leading position in the CDMA arena. With remarkable breakthrough in our GSM, WCDMA and CDMA businesses, we are confident to expand our business footprint in high-end markets in APAC and Europe.

According to the latest figures from the Mobile Worlddatabase, Aircel ended the first half of this year with just over 11.9 million subscribers - and a market share of 4.22%, making it the seventh largest mobile operator in the country (when including CDMA networks).