Technology giant Cisco has closed the acquisition of Starent Networks - a provider of mobile IP-based infrastructure technologies for mobile and converged telecommunications carriers. The $2.9 billion deal was originally announced in October.

By making the acquisition, Cisco is aiming to capitalize on the growing market for mobile telephony equipment, whose growth has been spurred by the growth of "mobile Internet" as "IP-enabled smart phones and other connected mobile devices gain rapid acceptance," according to a Cisco statement.

Starent solutions aim to enable service providers to scale their mobile infrastructure, providing multimedia intelligence, core network functions and services for access management between 2.5 G, 3G and 4G radio networks and a mobile operator's packet core network.

Starent will become part of Cisco's Mobile Internet Technology Group and its former President and CEO Ashraf Dahod will become the new group's VP and general manager.

"Combining Cisco's strength in video and IP with Starent Networks' leading mobile infrastructure solutions creates a compelling portfolio of products that provides an integrated architecture to offer rich, quality multimedia experiences to mobile subscribers on 3G and 4G networks," Dahod said in a statement in October.

Tewksbury, Mass.-based Starent's products have been deployed in CDMA2000 (1X, EV-DO), UMTS/HSPA and WiMax networks. The company was founded about nine years ago.