Under the agreement, Ericsson will provide infrastructure and services for GSM/GPRS/EDGE, Unified Messaging System, MMS, and Intelligent Network.

The GSM network infrastructure will cover circles in northern and eastern India. These circles account for nearly half of country's population and are extremely important to Dishnet Wireless Limited in reaching out to semi urban and rural areas of the country. The current tele-density of 1.4% from these circles offers a great potential for the future and will drive the GSM growth in India.

"We are confident that Ericsson will be an excellent partner in helping us bring next level of GSM/GPRS/EDGE wireless access to our customers," said Mr. V. Srinivasan, Chief Executive Officer of Dishnet Wireless Limited. "We expect the result of our collaboration to bring the most powerful, feature-rich voice and data service for our GSM subscribers."

"Ericsson takes great pride in this opportunity to work with Dishnet Wireless Limited to deliver high network capacity and quality of service to its subscribers," said Jan Campbell, Managing Director, Ericsson India. "With Ericsson's extensive expertise in implementing advanced and future-proof networks, we are fully committed to support Dishnet Wireless Limited in developing a wide-range of mobile communications and data services."