Silicon Valley: California-based telecommunications equipment provider UTStarcom Inc is making major inroads into the Indian market with an unannounced sales deal worth more than $ 100 million with Reliance Infocomm Ltd of India, the Silicon Valley Biz Ink reported.

The new service, Reliance IndiaMobile, is the first mobile service in India that combines voice and data delivery on handsets with computing capabilities.

Though UTStarcom, which makes telecom equipment hardware and software, would not comment on the deal, sources said the contract is the company's single-largest deal. The contract is expected by industry analysts to last three years.

Quoting industry insiders in India, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the publication said that a large project team from UTStarcom this week "is sitting inside Reliance offices in Bombay".

UTStarcom has sold equipment to Reliance in the past.

Deals with Indian companies will fuel future growth of the company.

In 2002, China drove more than 80 per cent of UTStarcom's $ 981.8 million revenues, an increase of 57 per cent from $ 626.8 million in 2001, said company CEO Hong Lu.

Yankee Group senior analyst X J Wang said UTStarcom's strategy was very smart. "They focus on emerging markets like China and India ... where they are still buying telecom infrastructure."

PTI