1959 - History of Ericsson - History of Ericsson

NEWS from
All Quarters of the World
Important Telephone Contract
from United Arab Republic
In stiff competition with two other
world telephone enterprises. L M
Ericsson has secured a large order
from the United Arab Republic. Under
this contract Ericsson will deliver
automatic telephone exchange equipment
for Cairo and five other towns
in the Nile Delta, and will also participate
in a planned Egyptian telephone
factory for the manufacture of
certain Ericsson products on licence.
The negotiations, which have been in
progress for some time, culminated
in the signing of the contract at the
beginning of November during the
visit to Cairo of Mr. Sven T. Aberg.
Automatic telephone exchange
equipment will be installed to a value
of 26.4 million kronor, catering initially
for 44,000 subscribers, in
Cairo, 20,000 local lines are to be
delivered for the Opera Exchange,
and 10,000 lines for the Abassia Exchange.
Local exchange equipment is
also to be delivered to the towns of
Benha, Damanhour, Mehalla El Kobra.
Mansoura and Tantah in the Nile
Delta.
The contract also includes automatic
trunk switching centres for traffic
between Cairo, Alexandria and the
five Delta towns. The delivery of exchange
epuipment is to start in roughly
one year's time, and the cut-overs
are planned to take place within two
to three-and-a-half years. The telephone
exchange contract was signed
by the Telephone Administration of
the United Arab Republic.
The contract for local manufacture
was concluded with the General Organization
for Executing the Five
Year Industrial Plan. The United
Arab Republic, with engineering assistance
from L M Ericsson, will
build a factory for the production on
licence of automatic exchange equipment
of crossbar type, telephone instruments,
private automatic exchanges,
and manual switchboards for local
and long distance traffic.
Ericsson will train Egyptian technicians
for future work in operating
the exchanges and in works management.
Ericsson has delivered telephone
equipment to Egypt for more than 50
years. Among other equipment delivered
since the war may be mentioned
an automatic 500-switch type of exchange
installed in Suez in 1951.
Even at that time the Egyptian government
was aware of the necessity
for a highly modern automatic telephone
system to keep pace with the
rapid industrial expansion of the
country. An expert commission was
appointed which, during a period of
several years, made a study of the
various world telephone systems
available. The outcome is now seen
in the recent contract awarded to
L M Ericsson.
(Above) H.E. Moustapha Khalil, Minister of
Communications of the U.A.R. and Mr. Sven
T. Aberg signing the telephone exchange section
of the contract. Seated at far left is the
Director General of the U.A.R. Telephone
Administration, Mahmoud Mohamed Riad.
(Below) H.E. Aziz Sedki, Minister of Industry,
shaking hands with Mr. Aberg after signing
the factory section of the contract.