Anti-corruption investigators in Beijing are expected to launch an inquiry into multibillion-dollar deals Lucent Technologies and others secured to supply the country’s vast telecom market.

Lucent Technologies, one of the biggest US telecom equipment makers, has reportedly submitted an 800-page report to investigators into possible violations of US anti-corruption laws involving its China operations.

South China Morning Post quotes sources as saying that the anti-corruption bureau of Beijing Municipal People’s Procuratorate is having the report translated.

They believe investigators will use the report to launch a comprehensive probe of the country’s telecom industry. Investigators are hopeful the report will provide names of individuals and companies implicated in the violations.

Most of the country’s telecom companies are Lucent clients, including China Telecom, China Unicom and China Netcom. Some officials and operators have allegedly received huge bribes for approving purchases of equipment worth hundreds of millions of US dollars from both foreign and domestic makers.

Officials from Lucent’s China operations said they were not aware of the report being handed to investigators, while the company’s Asia-Pacific office declined to comment.

In April, Lucent Technologies announced it had dismissed four senior executives from its China operations for allegedly violating the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

Curiosity was provoked last week when China Unicom, China Mobile and China Telecom exchanged senior managers, apparently to “curb irrational industry competition.”

(CRI November 9, 2004)