Franco-U.S. telecommunications equipment company Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) Tuesday said it has been selected as China Mobile Ltd.'s (CHL) sole supplier for the deployment of a fiber-to-the-home network in 10 Chinese cities.

China Mobile will deploy Alcatel-Lucent's gigabit passive optical networking, or GPON, solution in the Chinese provinces of Anhui and Guangdong to deliver ultra-high-speed services to residential and business users, Alcatel-Lucent said in a press release.

The contracts were secured through Alcatel-Lucent Shanghai Bell, Alcatel-Lucent's Chinese flagship company, the company added.

Alcatel-Lucent didn't provide financial details of the deal.

The fiber deal is another key win for Alcatel-Lucent in a market where operators are investing massive amounts of money to upgrade their networks and which has turned into a major sales growth hope for telecom equipment vendors.

Western gear companies like Alcatel-Lucent, Nokia Siemens Networks (NOK, SI) and LM Ericsson Telephone Co.(ERIC) have been fighting for market share in the country, aiming for a slice of its investment in improving the networks as demand in other parts of the world is hit by the recession and as western operators focus on preserving cashflow.

In April, Alcatel-Lucent reached a $1 billion deal with China Mobile, the world's largest mobile operator with more than 400 million subscribers, to supply second generation solutions and third generation equipment based on a relatively new technology developed mainly in China, called TD-SCDMA, or Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access.

Company Web site: www.alcatel-lucent.com

-By Ruth Bender, Dow Jones Newswires; +33 1 40 17 17 40; ruth.bender@dowjones.com