Nokia’s Growing North American Foothold

- Nortel + Nokia = No KIA

- Nokita = sounds more Asian; will attract business there

- No Quita = spanish: "no quitter"

No, wait, that means stuff like "free (from obligation), clear (from a charge), release (people), remove (jobs), take (bonus), steal (uh, market share)

Should read Si Quita.

Oh and before I forget...

HAPPY CANADA DAY !

Milan

More on MatlinPatterson:

"U.S. 'vulture fund' eyeing Nortel

MatlinPatterson works on competing bid for wireless asset auction, believes company can survive without breakup"

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Business/vulture+fund+eyeing+Nortel/1748765/story.html

everybody should watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te7za5upSWk&feature=PlayList&p=7787B92DED4B3D10&index=0&playnext=1
It is hilarious,a funny Whackney parody. :)

Classics ... I enjoyed watching them again.

NSN has to grow somewhere, why not America? Considering NSN was a willing vendor of eavesdropping equipment to Iran in 2008, it's a sign they're running out of 3rd world banana republic dictators who want to buy their gear:

http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=991037&lang=eng_news&cate_img=35.jpg&cate_rss=news_Business

NSN now can exploit Nortel technology to further assist the clobbering and bludgeoning of protestors.

The Nortel gear will not come equipmed with a technology differentiation software feature as that requires 6 more years of a six sigma project with 2456 Directors managing 67 Senior Managers who are managing 3 intern software engineers, and 128 sales resources scattered in every country to include the UN.

However the immediat use of 1200lbs of outsourced scrap metal from China does support the idea of a bludgeoning weapon.....

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/17/us/prosecutors-detail-lavish-way-of-life-of-double-agent-suspect.html

Ms. Leung, who is fluent in Cantonese, Mandarin and English, also was paid $1.2 million in 1995 and 1996 for negotiating a deal that allowed Nortel Telecommunications to do business in China, prosecutors said.

As Nortel's representative, Ms. Leung, who used the business name ''Merry Glory'' for the deal, received 3 percent of any contract that she obtained for Nortel, they said.

Prosecutors said a review of Ms. Leung's personal tax returns showed that she reported neither the F.B.I. payments nor the Nortel payments as income on her on federal income tax filing, as required by the Internal Revenue Service.
____________________________

Nortel has been harletting principles for cash since the 90's.

Criticized for supplying equipment to China's government to spy on their own citizens.

More recently, Ethical Funds threatened resolutions along with Amnesty Int'l protests until the board appeased them in 2007, years later.

http://www.amnesty.ca/take_action/actions/sharepower_nortel_action.php

Hmmm, travel to talk with Telefonica Argentina? That previously was seen as a Nortel wireline business. When I worked with others to show that Telefonica Argentina was interested in CDMA 450 we were told "no way". More of the same......just playing the systems for salary and bonus pay.

In fact it is an AS5200 project....

Interesting...several years ago Telefonica contacted me (I was in the wireless org) about seeing some other products than those that the local Buenos Aires Nortel office was promoting. Certainly others were offering gear that was of greater interest. Hopefully my Sunrise contact set up the time in their demo center.

But the bottom line is, which some here have missed, that the 2500 employees are not all from Canada...but are from Nortel globally. While there may be some R&D (CDMA is mature so I'm not certain why) many will have the M designation...marketing...so that NSN/Nokia can build the business with Nortel's current CDMA customers. Those not involved with marketing/direct customer relations (e.g. standards or similar if any are left) should not expect to be kept. Nokia has execllent staff for those functions...who I have worked with over the past 14 years.

So Nokia excellence lies in standards which can be downloaded off the internet and that takes 14 years to figure out.......how about developing a product from the 14 years of standards? Oh wait, we will buy that from Nortel.....

No, Nokia realizes that they need CDMA as a means to an end...opening the way to new markets/customers. They didn't need it in Europe or many other markets where they are successful...but their penetration of the infrastructure market in NA is very low...so this is a way in. Imagine that...doing things that support business development......a new idea yes?

So you are the decider? He he he he!!!!LOL.

I worked with Nokia and others over the years to open markets...in a technology neutral way. Of course the view from many within Nortel was that doing so was "collusion"...they would say that either Nortel would do it on its own or not at all. I guess in the wireline world that worked...especially with proprietary technologies.....which in general are not successful in the wireless business.

"You still have a lot of milking left on that cow.”

I disagree in that there is "a lot" left.

Excluding China, CDMA's rate of decline seems to have eluded them.

If it was such a hot deal why was it so hard to sell and why did the government sweeten the deal with an EDC loan.

I already knew this, but here's an interesting article
http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=178671

"...That, at least, is the view of JP.MorganChase analyst Ehud Gelblum, who issued a research note Monday stating that Nortel's LTE patents could generate royalty revenues of hundreds of millions of dollars, possibly even as much as $2.9 billion..."

"...
However, the analyst believes a more realistic scenario is that Nortel's LTE patents could more realistically generate almost $950 million in royalties during the next 15 years, based on Nortel collecting only 0.5 percent of each device sale price, with a 10 percent discount, and with Nortel only managing to collect the royalties on 65 percent of relevant devices.

Gelblum adds, though, that "any cash generated by Nortel’s LTE patent portfolio would likely go to offsetting obligations to creditors and pension funds," leaving shareholders without a share of the proceeds.
..."

after reading that article it sems that things just don't add up.

The way Mike has apparently given up so fast on any hope of a restructured new Nortel is odd considering the way he was once touting Nortel's intecllectual property like mimo and 40G.

But more interestingly is the fact that this vulture fund run by Matlin claiming that the agreement with Nokia/Siemens is designed to stifle the stocking horse bid of $650 m-obviously Nortel's creditors are forcing the issue and not considering the longer term financial benefits that Nortel's IPR could bring in or Mike and co have simply taken the easiest way out and have arranged some kind of a bonus scheme that they will benefit from if Nokia/Siemens end up with their CDMA business.

Maybe this Matlin guy should buy all of Nortel and agree to so much on the dollar with Nortel's current debt holders.

Maybe shareholders would still end up with nothing but at leasst we would get a chance to see what Nortel's current management is truly forfeiting in the name of bonus money along with a quick exit for them.

It is all pretty simple if you just review and analyze properly.
The BOD have been inept for the last 10 years or more.
John Roth spent like a drunker sailor due to ego.
Frank Dunn Cooked the Books and made a bad situation worse.
Billy Owens couldn't find his way to the mens room.
Mike could never understand the complexity and requirements needed to run a high technology company. GE only make lightbulbs. He came in after Dunn so things were pretty well Done at that time due the incredible "openness, tolerance and honesty" of the Canadians.
Make sure you are honest (accoounting fiasco) and come clean when evil doing is being done.. The government and guys like john manley will go to bat for the innocent employees after the fact. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.
The Canadian Federal And Provincial Government had no interest in helping Nortel because of Three Reasons--
1- Canadian Owned.
2- Ego hurt due to stock losses.
3- Don't care about pensioners who have lived in Canada for generations. Only care about new immigrants, GM and foreign aid.

There never was a restructuring plan.
Mike was humiliated and embarrassed after the parliament hill visit and dropped the other shoe pretty well the next day.
Anymore questions?

Off subject but an interesting article anyway...

https://www.fis.dowjones.com/WebBlogs.aspx?aid=DJFLBO0020090629e56u000b5&ProductIDFromApplication=&r=wsjblog&s=djflbo

True story: There are Directors at Nortel who focus on the cost side of the business in very destructive ways. For instance, they will question the mobility bills for the resources who have customer connections and take action to limit the spend. We are talking saving $900 per year type of discussions.

What they missed even when highlighted: The debt structure interest rates alone was greater than all customer communication cost for all of Nortel!!

This is the type of focus these "leaders" had on the organization. So imagine you not being able to take customer calls (the folks who paid your bills) because these so called "dinosaur directors" would question your mobile bill.

Hey, even at the JCI6 level the focus was on sending folks with customer contacts to meetings with either no mobile phone connectivity or only MCS (if it worked) or using local SIM cards...the latter meant that no one other than those you sent the number to could find you. Oh, and using cast off phones from the ELT/more senior folks and adding the local SIMs to them....yeah...lot of focus but when was the last time Mike Z or a BoD person had to watch their cell bill?

.."when was the last time Mike Z or a BoD person had to watch their cell bill?"
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
The answer is, before they started lining their pockets with money stolen from others and/ or made off of other peoples misery..which may mean when they started at Nortel, or perhaps even pre-Nortel days for most of them. Don't you get it? You are not equal to them-they are the top-notch talent that Nortel just had to hang on to at any cost. A cell phone bill is immaterial to their ilk.

Yes...my director had us buying/renting SIM cards, using outdated phones to save $40 - 50 /month. Of course he would multiply that times the number of his direct reports and then report to the ELT just how much he saved Nortel..

Never mind that those (inside and outside) who needed to contact us couldn't.

Mike

That's pretty damn self-serving. When a company thinks "small" that's what they get-they are as good as the people who represent them in the sales force.. it has nothing to do with entitlement.. sales people are primarily the face of a comapny, and when you short shrift them to cut corners, you diminish the company image in the eyes of current or prospective customers.

It was not unusual for a review of each and every call a direct report made in a month and question why it was made......a real useful use of JCI6 time, right? Marketing folks are indeed the face of the company, as are those working in standards bodies where the customers also participate. I have clear memories of an E/// participant saying that he was told to use the technology that they were selling...while Nortel folks had to be concerned about would they be reimbursed for making a call.....

I though Nortel was a communications company!.
We had the same in Europe. "You can't have a mobile phone, you are only a xyz". Made us look silly in front of customers. One distributor even asked me if I'd like to borrow his phone.

Nortel JCI6 Directors gave marketing life to "pay as you go" into bankrupcy mobile service......

In a related note...there is a sales director in CALA who had traveled from Sunrise to Buenos Aires at least 10 times since Ch-11 filling. The excuse is a pay-as-you-use project with Telefonica, which had not generated $1 revenue and will not in the near future (who is naive enough to believe Telefonica will launch today a brand new service based on Nortel technology???). Telefonica is playing here to delay the matter until they know who is going to buy the business unit involved...

By the way, this director is travelling business and spending comfortable nights at Sheratons, Hiltons and alike...

NortelSouth,

That´s 2 trips per month to Argentina whose currency has depreciated 33% against the greenback and 20% against the Canadian dollar in this same period. Certainly, it´s getting more expensive each day for Telefónica Argentina to make a deal.
Yet, the talented sales director for CALA continues to go his merry way.

There´s only one bigger fool here and that´s his boss who surely has to sign off on the expense reports. I guess that would be Barrios.

It is Barrios indeed, but he is not the fool but he is master puppet...

Save cents by not buying pencils for the office but spend thousands of dollars on travel.

there are many others. last chance milking opportunity. the ones who are travelling (some all the way to Asia) are gloating on collecting as many airmiles, hotel chain points as possible. the ones who can travel are also being allowed to keep motivation up.

no wonder this company is in the sewage tank.

You nailed it! Someone told me this director is collecting miles for his favorite travel destinations: F1 car racing...

Another example:

John Rose, the ex-CTO/evangelist, held this conference in Florida where more than 300 people from Nortel were flown in from all parts of the world at a tremendous cost, and where they discussed topics from lala land. Most of the people who attended this conference were managers and their pet staff, who didnt understand the technical matters. They simply went there and had a good time.

And on top of that, to accomodate this stupid extravagenza, the VPs blew off the legitimate highly essential travel budgets originally assigned to legitimate revenue earning projects!!! Go figure that..the guy who preached hyperconnectivity and telepresence, didn't follow his own damn sermons.

Ah yes, the Nortel sense of entitlement lives on even as the ship slips beneath the waves. How dare a sales director question a probationary peddler's expenses! The peddler has "customer connections" !

I do so hope that someone compiles a list of Nortel euphemisms before the lights go out. Customer connections, solution pack, innovation platform, strongly nonconcur; all of those examples of Nortelian Doublespeak must be preserved for posterity.

Milan

Zdravo Milane,

That doublespeak actually originated at GE and Z brought it w/him. My all time favorite is 'forcefully optimistic'; how can optimism be forced?...-- bb

In order to practice "forceful optimism" you need a couple henchmen who are not too bright and simply follow blind orders.

Curtain opens and you have Hackney and Flanagan. One two punch - Sales and Operations.

Hackney sells nothing, Flanagan operates at six sigma quality what Hackney sells. When you find out that Hackney widgets are not flowing through the enterprise, you downsize through outsourcing and then use "forceful optimism" to keep everyone else focused.....or else....

Sounds like a horror flick; stuck between Dracula and the Wolfman...--bb

Au contraire BB Bill

My servitude at NT preceded Mr. Z and the boys from GE. I was gifted to serve under Monte, Roth, Dunn and the rest of the RCMP (Real Canadians Make President) execs.

Nortelian Doublespeak originated with the inbred Canadians, iron ring wearing engineers all, who sincerely believed that NT products were engineered so soundly that they sold themselves.

My personal favorite bit of Nortelian Doublespeak was "the numbers have hardness" Used to project (fabricate) sales revenues.

Another favorite "Right angle turn" used by race car Roth when he put the company in the ditch.

Milan

You need both.....

Nortel = a product without strategy/leadership
GM = leadership/strategy without a product

I stand corrected! Now I know why the GEngsters were attracted to NT in the first place; sounded familiar...--bb

-BK was not imminent (two weeks later?)
-monetizing MEN (selling MEN would sound worse?)
-we stopped the rate of rev decline!
(that one was after Q1 09 when rev fell down 37% and would mean that in q2 would fall less than that but I am sure total for H1 would be more than 50% in comp to H1 08)
-leapfrog into 4G (as explanation why they sold 3G unit to ALA)
-we lost some ground in some segments but gained in others (when they were losing rev. anyway)
-fired for cause (but not telling what was the cause)
-"managerial margin improvement" (showing false improvements all the way down with BK at the end)

Remember taking water out of the fountain at Richardson's Fountain Court? Or, taking away coffee cups, and coffee altogether on even numbered floors?

All the while the executives and BoD were raking it in - as they continue to do today, legally - planning for BK, reducing personal risk, pumping the stock as a "good buy", while cutting the ranks. Demoralizing, isn't it?

Deuteronomy 32:35 Vengeance is Mine, and recompense; Their foot shall slip in due time; For the day of their calamity is at hand, And the things to come hasten upon them.

lol - the shirts eventually dumped the overpaid staff running the Showcase Lab, too.
If anyones got the chart handy; I'll bet NT stock spiked that day. Sure.

Must get going quickly because E/// and Alcatel are not waiting around for the formal Nortel/NSN introductions. i.e. who gets what office, what director is a clueless dinosaur just coming out of the 1980's telecom cave, and what will our business cards look like.

The world has changed and they don't understand that the young engineers are running circles around that so called "great yester-gear"

At least the lucky few Nortel CDMA workers who transfer to NSN will have some kind of steady employment for a year or two (per the transfer agreement and the maintenance business mentioned). That's a better deal than they have now. It'll give them a chance to move into other NSN divisions or the extra time to find work elsewhere.

The lucky CDMA marketing workers...I don't see a lot of reason for keeping standards/R&D folks around for this "mature" technology. Milk it for the near term dollars and the path into current CDMA operators for LTE. The latter Richard Lowe very eloquently said "Nortel does not have a strategy" for.