Mobile World Congress - Barcelona, February
12, 2008 - Alcatel-Lucent(Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU)
and NEC (TSE:6701) today announced the start of a broad collaboration
to market advanced end-to-end communications solutions.
As an important first step in this collaboration, Alcatel-Lucent and
NEC have decided to form a joint venture that will focus on the
development of Long Term Evolution (LTE) wireless broadband access
solutions. These solutions will support the network evolution of
leading customers around the world, such as NTT DoCoMo, who has already
selected NEC as a vendor for commercial service deployment of its Super
3G (LTE) project, and Verizon, with whom Alcatel-Lucent has already
initiated a LTE trial program. Through this joint development effort,
the two companies intend to accelerate the availability of
next-generation wireless solutions.
Leveraging the common LTE product strategy and platform of the joint
venture, Alcatel-Lucent and NEC will each manage delivery, project
execution and dedicated support to their respective customers.
Under this joint venture, the two companies will pool their existing
research & development resources and leverage market-proven
expertise in key technologies on which next-generation wireless access
is based, such as IP, multiple input/multiple output (MIMO) and
orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA). Through this
joint development effort, Alcatel-Lucent and NEC are affirming their
R&D investment commitments and combining them to accelerate
product innovation, differentiation and performance. The goal of the
two companies is to achieve faster commercial availability of LTE
solutions, serve an expanded, global customer base, and establish a
leading position in the early development phase of the LTE market. The
two companies will make first commercial releases available in 2009,
and will leverage their field-proven wireless expertise to ensure
smooth integration of LTE technology with the existing W-CDMA/HSPA and
CDMA/EV-DO networks of their respective customers.
"By leveraging complementary portfolios, robust research and innovation
capabilities, and strong market positions in Japan and around the
globe, the partnership is well positioned to hasten the evolution
towards the next-generation of mobile services," said Philip Marshall,
who heads up technology research at Yankee Group. "This is a smart
pairing that will help accelerate the availability of LTE by
capitalizing on early market implementations that we expect to
occurring Japan and North America."
"This strategic collaboration with NEC is driven by scale,
time-to-market, and product excellence objectives, and it will put us
in a strong position to ride the next wave of transformation in the
wireless industry," said Pat Russo, CEO of Alcatel-Lucent. "By drawing
upon our combined innovation capabilities, we will be able to
effectively accompany leading operators as they migrate their network
to next-generation wireless broadband technology, hence sustaining the
value of their networks well into the future," she added.
"This collaboration gives us the potential to open up new market
opportunities for advanced wireless services globally," said Kaoru
Yano, President of NEC Corporation. "Moreover, NEC's core competence
lies in integrated IT/network solutions business. Through this
alliance, we intend to explore the potential for collaboration with
Alcatel-Lucent to best leverage both companies' market-leading
capabilities in a wide range of fields. We expect this partnership to
contribute to the execution of our next-generation network business
strategy by expanding our reach into global markets."
In the future, the collaboration is expected to expand into end-to-end
third-generation (3G) CDMA-based solutions, as well as a wide range of
advanced IP-based solutions, such as optical transmission, IP service
routing, and IMS-based communications services. Alcatel-Lucent and NEC
will also investigate collaborating in developing IT solutions for
service providers - such as service application .solutions (e.g.
streaming, e-commerce, etc.)- together with the servers and storage
products on which those solutions depend.
About NEC
NEC Corporation is one of the world's leading providers of Internet,
broadband network and enterprise business solutions dedicated to
meeting the specialized needs of its diverse and global base of
customers. NEC delivers tailored solutions in the key fields of
computer, networking and electron devices, by integrating its technical
strengths in IT and Networks, and by providing advanced semiconductor
solutions through NEC Electronics Corporation. The NEC Group employs
more than 150,000 people worldwide. For
additional information, please visit the NEC home page at: www.nec.com
About Alcatel-Lucent
Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) provides solutions that
enable service providers, enterprise and governments worldwide, to
deliver voice, data and video communication services to end-users. As a
leader in fixed, mobile and converged broadband networking, IP
technologies, applications and services, Alcatel-Lucent offers the
end-to-end solutions that enable compelling communications services for
people at home, at work and on the move. With operations in more than
130 countries, Alcatel-Lucent is a local partner with global
reach. The company has the most experienced global services team in the
industry, and one of the largest research, technology and innovation
organizations in the telecommunications industry. Alcatel-Lucent
achieved revenues of Euro 17.8 billion in 2007 and is incorporated in
France, with executive offices located in Paris. For more information,
visit Alcatel-Lucent on the Internet: www.alcatel-lucent.com