March 16, 2015--Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the telecom business of Sunrise Technology, a provider of IT services in the operations and business support systems (OSS/BSS) domain. Sunrise Technology, which is headquartered in Guangzhou, China, will continue to exist as a separate entity - serving customers in sectors other than telecom.
The unit being acquired has a strong track record of delivering complex IT solutions to leading operators in China. Approximately 1,000 employees - almost all of whom are based in Guangzhou - will join Ericsson by Q2 2015, subject to customary closing conditions These employees have expertise in IT consulting; systems integration for charging and billing systems, customer relationship management and business intelligence/analytics solutions; and application development and maintenance.
Magnus Mandersson, Executive Vice President and Head of Business Unit Global Services at Ericsson, says: "China is the world's biggest mobile market in terms of number of subscriptions, with 1.285 billion. Most of the country's telecom operators are at the beginning of their IT transformation journeys, and will soon replace their legacy IT systems with next-generation solutions that will enable them to launch digital offerings. The acquisition of Sunrise Technology's telecom business will boost our ability to serve mobile operators' IT transformation needs in China, and is aligned with our strategy of becoming a global ICT leader."
"The completion of this acquisition significantly strengthens our position in China and shows our commitment to the market," says Mats H. Olsson, Senior Vice President and Head of Asia-Pacific at Ericsson. "The skills and experience of the Sunrise Technology employees will be key for us to continue providing leading services to our customers in China."
Ericsson's strategy to create value builds on a combination of excelling in our core business and establishing leadership in targeted growth areas. The acquisition of Sunrise Technology strengthens our position in OSS/BSS, which is one of the targeted areas. Great strides have been made already, with leading analyst firms describing Ericsson's OSS/BSS portfolio as the most comprehensive offering in the telecom market. To maintain momentum in OSS/BSS, Ericsson has previously acquired companies such as Telcordia (2012), TeleOSS and Telcocell (2013), GEOSS (2014), and TimelessMIND (2015).
Sunrise Technology's telecom business will be integrated with Ericsson's Global Services business, which employs 65,000 employees in 180 countries. Ericsson's consultants and systems integrators complete more than 1,500 consulting, systems integration and learning services projects in multi-vendor and multi-technology environments each year.
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