Nortel Wins US$135mn Network Expansion Contract from Cricket Communications

By Anuradha Shukla

TMCnet Contributing Editor

 

Nortel (News - Alert) will supply Cricket Communications with CDMA equipment to expand its network coverage.

 

Under the three year, US$135 million agreement, Cricket will use Nortel CDMA2000 1X and EV-DO Rev A equipment to expand their affordable mobile voice and data services to new markets across the U.S. using recently acquired Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum.

 

The alliance will enable Cricket to enrich the mobile experience by offering customers and local businesses flat-rate, unlimited service over a high-quality, all-digital wireless network.

 

According to Glenn Umetsu, executive vice president, engineering and technical operations for Leap Wireless, Cricket is steadily expanding into new markets extending their unlimited services with no long-term commitment wireless plans to more and more subscribers.

 

With Nortel’s support the company has recently launched markets in New York and North Carolina.

 

Umetsu is pleased to expand their commitment with Nortel to bring their advanced CDMA products to their new AWS markets and continue offering their customers advanced voice and data services while maintaining their position on cost.

 

Utilizing CDMA 1xEV-DO Rev A equipment, Cricket has been expanding its coverage and upgrading its U.S. network. Leveraging the data speed capabilities of Nortel’s Rev A solution operators can serve more subscribers using the same spectrum and deliver new bandwidth-hungry applications like VoIP, real-time video, interactive gaming, location based services and rich media content like music and video.

 

“Cricket’s creative approach to the wireless market meets consumer demand for economical services head-on,” said Richard Lowe, president, Carrier Networks, Nortel in a statement to the press.

 

He continued: “Their continued choice of Nortel’s CDMA technology is providing Cricket customers with both a great wireless voice solution and the fastest mobile data service available in the market today.”

 

Cricket chose Nortel as a wireless infrastructure supplier in 2000. Since then Cricket has deployed Nortel infrastructure in markets covering more than 26 million potential subscribers including recent market expansions in Burlington and Raleigh-Durham, NC; Charleston, SC; and Rochester, NY.

 

Nortel delivers communications capabilities that make the promise of Business Made Simple a reality for their customers.

 

Cricket Communications, Inc., is a wholly owned subsidiary of Leap Wireless International (News - Alert), Inc.