ZTE and P1 ink USD28 million WiMAX contract

Chinese hardware vendor ZTE and Malaysian wireless broadband provider Packet One Networks (P1) have completed the signing of a USD28 million contract that will see the former plan, design and deploy WiMAX equipment for the second phase of P1’s rollout plans. Malaysia’s Business Times reports that the second stage of the rollout will run alongside the first phase, which P1 signed an agreement with France’s Alcatel-Lucent for, and P1 expects to deploy approximately 700 new base stations by the end of the year; ZTE’s deployment will focus on rural regions and the states along the East Coast and in Penang. P1 will spend around MYR1 billion (USD274.3 million) to support the network rollout over the next five years, and has said it is on track to reach 35% population coverage for its WiMAX network by the end of 2009.