Friday, 9 June 2006

Nokia to Buy Handsets from South Korea's Pantech for USD 129 Mln

Nokia has signed a deal to buy handsets from South Korea’s Pantech&Curitel Communications Inc. for USD 129 million. The mobile-phone making arm of the Pantech group said in a filing to the Korea Exchange that its U.S. unit, Pantech Wireless Inc., would supply two handset models to Nokia by December 2006.

Under the terms of agreement, Nokia will sell Pantech's camera phones and CDMA handsets using the EVDO technology for high-speed Internet access in North America.

Pantech had earlier this month signed another deal with Cingular Wireless to supply GSM phones. The deal value has not been revealed.

Shares of Pantech&Curitel surged on the news, rising as much as 15 percent at one point.

Pantech aims to raise U.S. handset shipments to 9.5 million to 10 million units in 2006 from an estimated 7 million in 2005.