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Technology Stocks : Plaintree (TSE:LAN,NASDAQ:LANPF) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Zvi Yammer who wrote (1305)	9/4/1998 9:51:00 PM
From: Bron-y-aur	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1606

Zvi Plaintree has a market cap of under $40M and Packet may get bought for $200M+!!!! We Plaintree shareholders REALLY got screwed by Nortel big time. This situation definitely be raised at the AGM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Colin Beaumont get this show on the road now PLEASE. Lets get the Nortel agreement finalized and some HUGE deals happening. Paris, Sept. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Alcatel SA, the world's No. 4 telecommunications-equipment maker, may be looking to buy another networking company to broaden its line of products and add U.S. customers, analysts said yesterday. A likely target is closely held Packet Engines Inc., a Spokane, Washington, startup that makes powerful switches for corporate networks and has its European headquarters in France, home to Paris-based Alcatel. Packet Chief Executive Bernard Daines said his company is in talks with undisclosed suitors. ''A lot of companies have come and talked to us about what would be good for us. We're still having a lot of those discussions,'' Daines said when asked about being purchased by Alcatel. Officials at Alcatel declined to comment. Alcatel, which will expand its presence in the U.S. phone- equipment market with the expected completion of its purchase of DSC Communications Corp. this month, wants to sell more Internet equipment. Buying Packet Engines would give Alcatel a line of gigabit Ethernet switches, faster than existing networking products and expected to generate about $400 million in sales industry-wide in 1999. ''Alcatel has shown a willingness to acquire technology, and (Packet Engines') products would help them,'' said Martin Pyykkonen, an analyst with CIBC Oppenheimer, yesterday. Alcatel's American depositary receipts, which each represent a fifth of an ordinary share, fell 1 1/4 to 32 1/16 yesterday; the shares have gained about 25 percent this year. Acquisition In June Alcatel agreed to buy Plano, Texas-based DSC for $4.4 billion to acquire its customers and products that route calls on local phone networks. The acquisition was approved by shareholders of both companies and is awaiting regulatory approval. Packet, which employs 200 people, has been shipping its switches since April, Daines said. That means it likely will fetch a higher price than other gigabit Ethernet startups such as Berkeley Networks Inc. and Yago Systems Inc., which had no revenue when they were bought, Pyykkonen said. In January, Cabletron Systems Inc. bought Yago in a stock purchase then valued at as much as $213 million. Last month, Fore Systems Inc. bought Berkeley for $250 million in stock and cash in a transaction whose price surprised some investors. Daines said the Berkeley purchase will help his company by raising the level of awareness about the technology. ''We think we're worth more than ($250 million),'' he said. Alcatel now resells networking products made by No. 1 networking company Cisco Systems Inc. and Xylan Corp. Xylan gets about 20 percent of its revenue from Alcatel sales. Cisco fell 1 to 90 5/8, while Xylan slipped 11/16 to 14 3/8 yesterday. ''Gigabit Ethernet products would be very useful to Alcatel,'' said John Armstrong, an analyst at Dataquest, the market research unit of Gartner Group Inc. Daines said succeeding in the European market is vital to his company. ''It's important for us to be there,'' Daines said.