Alcatel-Lucent (News - Alert) announced the launch of BlackBerry in Pakistan in association with ZONG, the first international brand of China Mobile (News - Alert) and Research In Motion.
Initially, ZONG is offering the BlackBerry (News - Alert) Curve 8900 and BlackBerry Bold smartphones and a choice of BlackBerry Internet Service or BlackBerry Enterprise Server, company officials said.
Using this service, ZONG customers will be able to wirelessly send and receive emails, make phone calls, browse the Internet, send text messages and access a wide range of corporate and lifestyle applications available on RIM Smartphones.
Under this partnership, Alcatel-Lucent provides ZONG with end-to-end implementation, launch, delivery and support services for the BlackBerry solution in the Pakistani market.
Alcatel-Lucent’s experience in managing the delivery, technology integration and deployment of the BlackBerry solution will enable ZONG to focus on providing the requisite customer services to match anticipated market demand, said officials at Alcatel-Lucent.
These end-to-end solutions and integration service enable operators in high-growth economies like Pakistan to efficiently roll out value-added services to their subscriber base, they said.
“Zong is committed to providing innovative services and expanding its portfolio of advanced telecommunications solutions,” said Salman Wassay, head of marketing at ZONG, in a statement. “There is increasing demand among our subscribers in both the enterprise and consumer markets to have remote access to their email and calendar information and the launch of the BlackBerry solution exemplifies our commitment to consistently meet our customers’ needs.”
According to Mark Guibert, vice president of Corporate Marketing, RIM, BlackBerry solution continues to lead the industry in providing an optimized and empowering mobile experience for organizations and individuals who want to make the most of their time.
Both BlackBerry Curve and BlackBerry Bold are popular devices designed with communications capabilities required for modern users. While BlackBerry Curve comes with built-in Wi-Fi (802.11 b/g) and Global Positioning System (GPS), BlackBerry Bold smartphone supports tri-band High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) networks around the world and comes with integrated GPS and Wi-Fi (802.11 a/b/g).
ZONG is offering BlackBerry Enterprise Server for corporate clients. This service, according to ZONG officials, tightly integrates with IBM (News - Alert) Lotus Domino, Microsoft Exchange and Novell GroupWise and works with existing enterprise systems to enable secure, push-based wireless access to email and other corporate data.
BlackBerry Internet Service is offered for individuals and smaller businesses. The service enables users to manage up to ten supported email accounts, including most popular ISP email accounts, from a BlackBerry smartphone.
The BlackBerry solution will be available immediately with ZONG’s postpaid packages, providing a range of monthly packages tailored to meet customers’ needs
Last month Alcatel-Lucent announced a similar agreement with Magticom Georgia and RIM to launch BlackBerry solution for Magticom customers in Georgia.
To find out more about Alcatel-Lucent, visit the company at the 4GWE Conference. To be held Jan. 20 to 22 in Miami and collocated with ITEXPO East 2010, the 4GWE Conference will focus on the realities of deploying 4G technologies and delivering broadband wireless applications to a growing community of wireless broadband consumers. Mary Baker, director of the company’s network and systems integration/services group is speaking during the show. Don’t wait. Register now.
Rajani Baburajan is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of Rajani's articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by Michael Dinan