Don't think I've seen this here, if so....ooops!
Northern Telecom Says France Telecom Testing Its New Products
Bloomberg News
March 18, 1999, 5:40 p.m. PT
Northern Telecom Says France Telecom Testing Its New Products
Brampton, Ontario, March 18 (Bloomberg) -- Northern Telecom
Ltd., the No. 2 phone-equipment maker in North America, said
France Telecom SA became its third customer to start testing new
products that put voice technology on data networks.
France Telecom, the biggest phone company in France, is only
running trials with the Succession line of products and hasn't
agreed to buy more, a spokesman for Northern Telecom said.
Northern Telecom, which uses the Nortel Networks brand name, has
said AT&T Corp., the No. 1 U.S. phone company, and No. 2 SBC
Communications Inc. are giving Succession a try.
Nortel developed the new products to alleviate congestion on
voice networks, a problem for many established phone companies,
by directing some traffic onto newer data networks. That could
open a door for it at France Telecom, which mostly uses equipment
it bought from Alcatel SA when both companies were state-owned.
''This is an opportunity to start wedging their way into
some of these companies,'' said Mark Lucey, an analyst at Kearns
Capital Ltd. who rates Nortel stock a ''buy.''
AT&T buys most of its equipment from Lucent Technologies
Inc., a company it spun off in 1996 and now the world's biggest
phone-equipment maker. It will test a Lucent product this summer
that's similar to Succession but that works only with Lucent
switches.
Succession is an ''open-platform'' system that works in
conjunction with any supplier's gear. Brampton, Ontario-based
Nortel unveiled the line last month and expects to begin shipping
the products in the fourth quarter.
Northern Telecom shares rose C$0.30 (US$0.20) to C$91.65.
France Telecom fell 1 euro to 75.50 (US$82.94). |
