E-Plus Picks Lucent for ATM 592912

BONN, Germany -- Lucent Technologies (NYSE:LU) today announced that it has been awarded a multi-million dollar contract with E-Plus, Germany's third largest wireless carrier, to supply data networking equipment and services to manage and consolidate voice and data traffic from the operator's third-generation (3G) Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) network. The implementation will enable E-Plus to use their existing transport infrastructure to efficiently manage the large increases in network traffic as customers subscribe to new 3G UMTS services.

Under the agreement, Lucent is providing the operator with PacketStar® (PSAX) 1000, 1250,2300 and 4500 Multiservice Media Gateways to provision and aggregate traffic onto its asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) network.

"We selected Lucent Technologies PSAX products because of their ATM capabilities, and their robustness and flexibility paired with their high port density," said Thorsten Dirks, managing director Innovation, Product Development, IT and Operations from E-Plus. This implementation will enable E-Plus to expand its existing infrastructure to support new services and is easily upgradeable to grow with the customer in the long run. This will result in reduced operational and capital expenditure for E-Plus."

Delivering up to five gigabits of redundant (or 10 gigabits of non-redundant) switching capacity, the PacketStar® (PSAX) portfolio offers the highest port capacity per inch of any product of its type on the market today. This is important for mobile operators where space at network edge sites is often limited. Additionally, key components of the product, the transmission modules, can be interchanged among the different PSAX base systems to increase flexibility and lower the total cost of ownership for E-Plus.

Lucent Worldwide Services, the services arm of Lucent Technologies, is working with E-Plus to provide integration and testing facilities to ensure a smooth transition of this solution into the E-Plus network.

"The Lucent PacketStar® (PSAX) technology offers a flexible, high-performance solution for E-Plus as they further develop their ATM infrastructure to support the rollout of 3G services for their subscribers," said Dr. Werner Irler, head of Mobility Sales for Lucent Technologies in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. "The PacketStar® technology is interoperable with other vendors equipment, enabling it to be easily installed into the customer's existing infrastructure."

Lucent Technologies Inc.

E-Plus Mobilfunk GmbH