China is shaping up to be a lucrative market for Alcatel-Lucent, which has secured its second network equipment deal in the market in as many weeks.

 

The vendor is preparing to upgrade China Unicom’s 3G network in ten provinces in the country, in a deal that comes hot on the heels of a contract to deploy a fiber network for rival carrier China Telecom.

 

Provinces covered by the expansion contract include Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Fujian, and the equipment installed will pave the way for future 4G rollouts, Alcatel-Lucent’s Asia Pacific president Rajeev Singh-Molares states.

 

The contract highlights China Unicom’s current focus on delivering high-speed broadband services to fixed and mobile subscribers. A fortnight ago the firm hired Nokia Siemens to deploy a 40G-capable DWDM network covering 5,000km across six provinces.