I don't know anything about the information you provide WRT why AT&T chose LU over CIEN. According to Patrick Nettles, CIEN's CEO, AT&T was testing both LU and CIEN 16 channel DWDM, but their recently announced workforce reduction required them to cut-back to one supplier. So it is an unqualified win for LU, but not such a big loss for CIEN. Chalk it up to T simply realizing that it makes no sense to devote its resources to maintaining TWO suppliers of 16 channel which is simply going to be antiquated when 40, 80, and 96 are all here or coming. If T is smart, a BIG assumption, it will groom LU for one product and CIEN for the next generation, and allow them to leapfrog each other ad infinitum.
More importantly, I think this only points out that it will take a while for TLAB shareholders to get used to CIEN's business model. CIEN is a nascent company, with huge, but very few, customers. WSJ said WCOM and Sprint make up 96% of revenue. That means CIEN can't make up for 25 million here 25 million there like LU and TLAB can when there is a shortfall (That's a rounding error to LU). That makes for constant, minute focus on customer contracts. And that also leads to big gyrations quarter to quarter. Down the road, CIEN's going to add a huge customer like AT&T or BT or Concert or QWEST, and we'll be off to the races again.
DougHboy. |
