Telecom NZ to go WCDMA

Rumours abound that Telecom New Zealand has tapped Alcatel-Lucent to deliver a GSM/WCDMA overlay for its existing CDMA network.

Local reports, which will come as another blow to the CDMA community, suggest that TCNZ has spent around NZ$400m (US$294.2m) on WCDMA-ready GSM infrastructure, which will overlay its 850MHz CDMA2000 1xEV-DO network.

It is expected that the operator is planning to use GSM at 850MHz for voice, leaving the 1xEV-DO network for data traffic.