Sprint Corp. this month announced two US$1-billion deals, tapping Nortel Networks Corp. and Lucent Technologies Inc. to provide hardware and software for the build-out of its upgraded wireless network. Sprint is setting up its 3G wireless service to bring faster Internet connection speeds to users and to make it more feasible to accomplish bandwidth-hungry tasks. Sprint expects to begin upgrading its PCS network with Nortel and Lucent products this year. Nortel and Lucent will receive close to $1-billion each over the next three years.