| |
Gorilla on the hunt!
quote.bloomberg.com
Cisco Says It Plans to Buy More Fiber-Optic Makers (Update2)
New York, Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Cisco Systems Inc., the
world's No. 1 maker of Internet equipment, said it plans to buy
at least one maker of fiber-optic gear in the next 12 to 18
months to add products to sell to phone companies.
Cisco is looking for equipment that boosts capacity on fiber
networks using wave division multiplexing, or WDM, Senior Vice
President Kevin Kennedy said. It also may seek to buy products to
send voice and data traffic on fiber over long distances.
The new products would help Cisco compete better with Nortel
Networks Corp. and Lucent Technologies Inc. as phone companies
look to fiber optics to handle Internet and data traffic that
doubles every nine months. Cisco started its line of fiber-optic
equipment by acquiring Cerent Corp., Monterey Networks Inc. and
Pipelinks Inc. this year.
''We'll look for an appropriate time to make an
acquisition,'' Kennedy said in an interview at the Warburg Dillon
Read Telecom Conference in New York.
Cisco shares rose 1/4 to 84 3/4. Shares of JDS Uniphase
Corp., the world's biggest maker of parts for fiber-optic
equipment, rose 4 7/8 to 199 7/8.
Kennedy said San Jose, California-based Cisco is evaluating
both startups like Cerent and more established WDM makers such as
Ciena Corp. He declined to name any companies it has considered.
''We're looking at all possibilities. They all have their
trade-offs,'' he said.
Linthicum, Maryland-based Ciena, with sales in fiscal 1998
of $508 million, has been mentioned in the past as a possible
target for Cisco. The company declined to comment last week on
speculation that it was in talks with Cisco.
NYSE/AMEX delayed 20 min. NASDAQ delayed 15 min.
|
|
