PARIS, Jan 16: French telecom equipment giant Alcatel-Lucent and Indian service provider Reliance Communications announced on Wednesday an eight-year deal worth more than $1.0 billion to catapult a big slice of Indian services into next-generation telecom services.The deal will involve the transfer of 4,000 Reliance staff to Alcatel-Lucent. The agreement is targeted at satisfying rapid growth of demand for applications and communications services in India which, the companies said in a statement, is one of the most dynamic in the world.

The head of mobile operations at Reliance Communications, Gurdeep Singh, said that the partnership represented a big change in the terms of the classic vision and limited scope of outsourcing services.

The deal meant that his company would be the first to offer new-generation telecoms services which would satisfy, and even exceed, the expectations of clients and would enable them to move up from simple telephone usage to integrated voice and data services across various devices and systems.—AFP