As an extension of a global agreement with Telefónica, the wireless backhaul provider Ceragon Networks has made a deal with the carrier’s Mexican unit to move forward with its network upgrades. With the addition of Mexico, Ceragon now provides high-capacity wireless backhaul solutions to Telefónica in four Latin American markets.
The vendor made a global agreement with the second largest telecom operator in Latin America, in early 2012. Since then, Ceragon has provided solutions to Telefónica’s units in Mexico, Venezuela, Panama and Chile.
In an interview with RCR Wireless News, Billy Cain, president of Ceragon Latin America, noted that since the Telefónica agreement was made, Ceragon has received more than U.S.$20 million in orders.
Cain said that the firm expects to extend the agreement with Telefónica to other countries. Cain noted that the huge demand comes more from carriers’ need to improve capacity than from LTE deployments, but he highlighted that the Ceragon solutions that have been deployed are LTE-ready.
“The largest opportunity comes from increasing capacity requirements, including LTE and 3G. Capacity requirements are much bigger now than few years ago,” Cain said.
Cain said that Latin America has played an important role for Ceragon’s business. The region’s revenues have increased over the last few years and are expected to continue to grow in 2013, according to Cain. “There are a lot of opportunities. We are working with almost all the large telecom operators in the region. A lot of carriers are refreshing their backhauls to become ready for more capacity,” he said.
