Alvarion lands first GSM deal

Alvarion today said it has received its first order for GSM equipment, marking the BWA vendor’s entry into the mobile cellular arena after acquiring InterWave Communications.

The contract is for a GSM network in the Republic of Sakha, a sparsely populated autonomous jurisdiction within Russia that spans three time zones and half-lies within the artic circle. The carrier Gorizont-RT contracted with STS to rollout its communications network, and STS in turn partnered with Alvarion/InterWave for the infrastructure.

Alvarion officials said InterWave specializes in compact, hardy mobile switching and base station equipment suited for harsh weather climates such as this Siberian deployment.

"The deal reflects Alvarion’s strategy regarding the merger with InterWave," said Alvarion CEO Zvi Slonimsky in a statement. "As the perfect alternative to wired telephony, this GSM solution is ideal for the remote areas of Russia. We are looking forward to similar sales of these economically compelling networks."

Alvarion closed its deal with InterWave last week after a very rocky courtship. The two companies announced the deal in July, agreeing to pay $56 million, but tried to back away from the deal two months later. InterWave sued, and Alvarion came back to the table, but only for a $40 million closing price. InterWave’s expertise in compact basestations designs for low-density markets piqued Alvarion’s interest since many of its sales channels target areas looking for wireline replacement. Alvarion is also a member of the WiMax forum and is gradually optimizing its equipment for mobile use. The vendor planned to integrate InterWave’s mobile technology into its own BWA product lines as it worked toward developing 802.16e equipment.

Alvarion is currently developing its first commercial line of WiMax 802.16d equipment. It has signed on with Intel for its baseband silicon and expects to have its first certified basestation and CPE out by the first half of 2005.

In other network-related news, Nortel Networks today announced it has been awarded a massive $500 million contract to expand BSNL’s GSM/GPRS network in India into the eastern and southern regions of the country. Earlier this week, Motorola revealed that it has been executing a major CDMA 1X rollout for China Unicom encompassing 11 provinces, including most of China’s major cities. Motorola valued the contract at $344 million.