Nokia has bagged a LTE deal from ALTAN Redes to build and operate a new LTE and 5G-ready wholesale network in Mexico – beating Ericsson and Huawei.

This will be Nokia’s largest-ever contract win by scale in Latin America. Nokia did not disclose the financial details of the LTE network deal.

The 4G network contract with Nokia includes 100 percent of the fully virtualized core network and 40 percent of RAN, IP backhaul, OSS and NOC. Nokia will deploy the LTE network in 5 regions of Mexico out of a total of nine, including Guadalajara and Monterrey, the country’s second and third largest cities.

Nokia said it will also deliver several services to the turnkey project including cell site acquisition, construction, deployment, Network Integration, network planning and optimization, master system integration (core), operation and maintenance and managed services.

The deployment, which will utilize 700 MHz frequency band, will generate operational efficiencies as it requires fewer sites to reach a wider coverage.

The company said Shared Network project will generate total investment of more than $7 billion over 9 years, financed by international and local investors ranging from financial institutions and development institutions to industrial partners in Mexico.

The 4G network contract also means that Mexico will join a growing number of countries deploying a 700 MHz APT network. It marks Nokia’s first deployment of a 100 percent virtualized core network in Latin America.

“It has been a very demanding selection process, since the Shared Network is, up to now, the most ambitious telecommunications project worldwide,” said Joaquin Coronado, managing director of ALTAN REDES.