Telecom equipment supplier Alcatel-Lucent and worldwide mobile operator China Mobile (News - Alert) have inked a co-creation deal to accelerate the development and testing of lightRadio projects at Alcatel-Lucent’s (News - Alert) Stuttgart lab. According to Alcatel-Lucent, the joint work will speed up the commercial introduction of its new product family to meet China’s growing customer demand for mobile broadband services. 

Exploiting dramatic growth in mobile Internet use worldwide, China Mobile reported around 650 million subscribers by the end of 2011. And the operator said that number is growing at a rate of 11.2 percent year over year. According to China Mobile, the new customers are increasingly adopting smartphones, tablets and other smart mobile devices, which is driving demand for high-bandwidth mobile data services such as video and Internet gaming worldwide. 

According to the partners, this new agreement follows the non-binding MoU signed between the two companies in mid 2011. Furthermore, the partners said it also builds on the collaboration between the companies to deliver superfast mobile broadband using TD-LTE technology, as well as the announcement of the first Trans-Pacific lightRadio video call. The two said that this latest agreement defines the projects that will be undertaken by the companies and kicks off the co-development activities.

As a result, the two companies plan to ready the lightRadio product prototype by the second half of the year. Alcatel-Lucent said that lightRadio reduces the size of traditional mobile base stations to a Rubik’s cube, while lowering power-consumption and allowing the transfer of vast amounts of data at lightning speed.

In a statement, said Ben Verwaayen (News - Alert), CEO of Alcatel-Lucent, "The ability for us to pair with the world’s largest mobile provider to gain deeper insight into its customer behaviors and the way services are evolving will ensure we develop lightRadio in the right direction. The knowledge we gain from implementing lightRadio to support the delivery of mobile broadband services to 650 million people will help us to meet the growing demand for services across the globe.”

 The co-operation pact was signed on January 13 by Bill Huang, president of China Mobile Research Institute and Wim Sweldens, president of Alcatel-Lucent Wireless Division, at Alcatel-Lucent’s Bell Labs (News - Alert) in Murray Hill, New Jersey.