Nokia acquires LCC International's U.S. deployment business

[Nikos Kartalis]

Nokia and LCC International Inc., announced that the companies have reached an agreement for LCC to transfer its U.S. deployment operations to Nokia. Deployment operations include civil works and site acquisition services. As part of the agreement, a number of LCC's existing U.S. deployment contracts and assets used to support the U.S. deployment operations will transfer to Nokia upon completion of the deal which is expected to close within the next 45 days. The agreement will impact up to 80 LCC employees, many of whom will have the opportunity to become Nokia employees.

This announcement further enables Nokia and LCC to execute on their respective strategies within the wireless sector. For Nokia, this move addresses operator demand for a partner that can deliver a complete range of services, from deployment operations to consulting and integration to managed services. Delivery services, in particular, continues to be a significant area for operators as they seek to reduce operating expenditures. The addition of LCC's deployment operations to Nokia's delivery services portfolio enhances a highly experienced team to execute network rollouts across the country. LCC continues to expand its world class engineering and wireless consultative services operation.

"This agreement is a direct result of LCC's strategy and plan that was announced earlier this year," Dean Douglas, LCC's CEO, said. "With LCC's exit from the deployment business in the U.S., we can now focus our resources to support the growing and expanding engineering and consulting services opportunities both domestically and internationally in the wireless marketplace." Mr. Douglas further adds, "We also wanted to ensure we minimized the impact to our deployment customers and employees throughout this transition and we believe this transition accomplishes that goal. We are proud of the work and effort that our deployment group has contributed to this operation and feel they will make a solid contribution to Nokia's Networks division."

"Nokia's Networks division has shown steady growth in North America, and today's announcement with LCC demonstrates a continuation of that growth and our commitment to providing services that address our customer's needs in North America," said Mark Louison, Senior Vice President, Networks, North America. "We look forward to expanding Nokia's full-range services portfolio with LCC's expertise in deployment operations to deliver a best-in-class customer experience."

The transaction is subject to certain closing conditions including customary conditions with respect to third party consents and similar matters described in the transaction documents. The terms of this transaction are summarized in a Form 8-K filed by LCC with the Securities and Exchange Commission on the same day of the issuance of this press release.