EU dumps anti-dumping probe; Alcatel-Lucent sells kit

Around the time Karel De Gucht, the European trade commissioner announced it was OK to dump on Europe (in fact some people pay good money for that) Alcatel-Lucent announced a megadeal in…. China.

Of course the two events could be unrelated ;-)

They may be more an example of choreography - the dance of the softened trade relations - than an explicit 'deal' (such a pejorative little word) involving a back room with no need to go outside for a cigarette. After all, such complex mobile infrastructure deals take years to hammer out and can’t really be treated like bargaining chips… can they?

Framework deals can. These are deal-shaped containers into which detailed sales of both goods and services can be added later as they are negotiated by the parties. In the Alcatel-Lucent/China Mobile case the ‘framework’ involves an upper limit of the monetary value for the entire deal. It can sit quite happily on the table as the negotiations proceed.

So... we have the European Commission suddenly no longer pursuing its anti-dumping investigation into imports from China of mobile infrastructure worth an annual….

€1 billion

And we have Alcatel-Lucent having just won a framework deal for mobile infrastructure with China Mobile worth…

€750 million

Alcatel-Lucent will be selling China Mobile both its fixed optical kit and its mobile broadband solutions including its small cell lightRadio and IP transport.

Alcatel-Lucent tiny small cell kit

Good work both.

But this is just the start of the process. De Gucht has indicated that the commission was still scheduled to look into illegal Chinese subsidies, which he describes as the more important, underlying issue (you can’t do extensive dumping without a subsidy from somewhere).

Here’s the kicker - the mooted subsidies investigation could be shelved subject to the satisfactory conclusion of up-coming trade meetings with China in the summer.

More infrastructure deals in the offing?

Karel De Gucht signing something

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