Hey, we’re nearly the end of 2007 so the news seems to be getting a little light as people hunker down for the holidays.
In the absence of news you can use, it seems like a good time for a poll on what Nortel should do in 2008. From the list below, select what you think is the biggest corporate priority. If you want, you can provide details/insight/suggestions in comments. I’ll publish the results and your advice for Mike Z. tomorrow.
1. Make a Major Acquisition
2. Stay the Course
3. Continue to Slash Costs
4. Sell Non-Competitive Units
5. Increase R&D
6. Other:
comments
nr 1 It’s wrong question. Mike tried to make major acquisitions and he was not able to do so, his attempts failed. Avaya, Force10, TLAB…
Nortel is left with no power for major acquisitions. You should rather ask if Nortel puts itself to be acquired. You would get some meaningful answers….
Point 2 and 3 talk about the same… cutting costs as Mike’s BT Plan projected. The Plan is not finished so staying on course means cutting the costs … What would be an alternate issue if Mike would like to change his Plan? We will never guess from the poll you designed…
Selling none competitive units is in the Plan too, so staying on course means selling more assets as well.
Basically point 4 is the same as staying on course…
point nr 5 increasing R&D is basically giving up on BT Plan or making big change in the Plan as Mike wanted to make R&D costs much lower! Much lower!
I don’t know how Nortel would do that?
Consolidating Nortel’s R&D with other big players would have sense… and we are coming back to a question if Nortel is ready to be acquired?
It looks like shareholders will not like it but in my opinion it’s better solution than hoping for miracles and losing the game.
In other words shareholders risk losing more if they don’t start demanding from Mike to look aggressively for merger partners or look for the best acquirer!
In the last 4 years Huawei grew up from a mid size company of $3.5 bill to current $11 bill of revenue
JNPR grew up 100% CSCO grew up 60%
NT revenue is slightly higher in last 4 good years for telecom vendors…
It shows that NT is not able to grow on it’s own in competing markets
Huawei has already booked $16 bill orders for the year 2008! Customers are buying from Huawei, from ZTE from JNPR…NT is losing some customers to competition….waiting is not the best answer! All parties can lose, the company, employees, Nortel’s customers and shareholders….
My prediction? In 2008 Nortel’s customers will put much more pressure on NT to show plans for stable future. NT stock is showing Mike’s weaker position…. You can forget days when Nortel went on shopping spree with strong stock as the currency…Be pragmatic with weaker NT or face the consequences…It’s interesting to watch Nortel; what will be the next step in that saga? Some analysts say that good years for telecom sector are almost over…
I say 2008 will be a good year for good companies and not so good for average companies…
What to Do in ’08?
Hey, we’re nearly the end of 2007 so the news seems to be getting a little light as people hunker down for the holidays.
In the absence of news you can use, it seems like a good time for a poll on what Nortel should do in 2008. From the list below, select what you think is the biggest corporate priority. If you want, you can provide details/insight/suggestions in comments. I’ll publish the results and your advice for Mike Z. tomorrow.
Technorati Tags: Mike Zafirovski, Nortel