Alcatel-Lucent announced on December 2 that it has obtained a CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) mobile network upgrade deal from China Telecom through its China unit Alcatel Shanghai Bell, according to a Sina report. Pursuant to the terms of the US$230 million deal, Alcatel Shanghai Bell will provide its end-to-end CDMA wireless networking solutions and a wide range of base stations for the upgrade and expansion of China Telecom's CDMA network in 56 cities of nine provinces. Alcatel-Lucent stated that the equipment used in the present network upgrade project allows for ready migration to 3G services in the future. The project is scheduled to commence operations by year-end 2008.

Also, according to the Sina report, China Telecom plans to invest 80 billion RMB (US$11.63 billion; US$1=6.88 RMB) overall in upgrading the company's CDMA mobile network over the next three years.