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Lucent, Motorola and China seal deal in Washington

Posted on: Thursday, 15 January 2004, 06:00 CST

The telecommunications industry was reinvigorated Tuesday as officials from Motorola Inc., Lucent Technologies and others signed roughly $2 billion worth of contracts with China.

The deals will continue to build China's wireless infrastructure and include products made or developed here.

"Overall, it's a great feeling of pride here today," said Roger Heinz, vice president of Convergence Solutions, one of Lucent's divisions in Naperville and Lisle that developed some products sold to China.

Lucent China President Jason Chi signed three contracts worth $350 million with China.

He was among about 100 officials, including U.S. Department of Commerce Secretary Donald Evans, at a contract signing ceremony Tuesday in Washington, D.C., part of a Telecommunications Industry Association seminar to encourage U.S. businesses to work with China.

"This shows how we're stepping out into the marketplace after a tough couple of years," Heinz said.

Lucent's facilities in Naperville and Lisle include Convergence Solutions, Mobility and Worldwide Services Organization, all divisions involved in developing the products for China Telecom and other recent contracts.

Specifically, Lucent sold its 5E-Xc switches from its Accelerate brand of voice-over Internet protocol products and its Personal Handyphone Systems, featuring a tiny wireless handset for the Asian market.

Lucent also signed two contracts with China Unicom intended to accelerate its communication systems and provide advanced multi- media communication services, said Lucent spokeswoman Mary Ward. She declined to break out the amounts for each contract.

In addition, Motorola executives were thrilled with the pomp and circumstance surrounding their major deals.

"It was tremendously inspiring, especially for the telecoms after the past two years of nothing but a downturn," said Motorola spokesman Steven Hendricks.

Adrian Nemcek, president and chief executive officer of Motorola's Global Telecom Solutions Sector in Arlington Heights, was among those who signed $1.1 billion in various contracts.

Motorola won a $556 million deal with China United Telecommunications Corp. for its voice and multimedia services to wireless customers.

The Schaumburg-based company also signed a $510 million deal with China Mobile Communication Corp. to improve and expand the Chinese wireless network, Hendricks said.

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