Lost in the hyperbole, emotion and political lobbying is a few important facts:
1. The CDMA business is a slow-dying dinosaur as GSM and new technologies such as LTE become increasingly popular.
2. Ericsson employs about 2,000 people in Canada, and it invested $126-million on R&D in Canada in 2008.
In summary, Ericsson isn’t buying an asset of “national interest”, and Ericsson is a good Canadian corporate citizen.
And after letting RIM control the “ring” for the past month, Ericsson is finally coming out swinging. In an interview with the Globe & Mail, Ericsson Canada president Mark Henderson said:
“We have been surprised that the position Ericsson has had in Canada this long, and some of these other messages that we have tried to clarify – about what the deal is really composed of and what the net benefits are of the transaction – have been sort of lost in the mix.
Prediction: The Canadian government will not review the Ericsson-Nortel deal. It makes for sexy news when there’s not a lot happening but that’s about it.
In a move that paves the way for 4G wireless, LG Electronics and Nortel (NYSE: NT) completed the first active handoff between a CDMA and a Long-Term Evolution network. The move is important because LTE networks will take time to deploy and they will have to co-exist and rely on CDMA networks for fallback or gaps in coverage. In the United States, CDMA is the technology used by Sprint Nextel (NYSE: S) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) Wireless for voice and mobile data. Verizon has already laid out aggressive LTE deployment plans using its portion of the 700-MHz spectrum, and it is aiming for a nationwide 4G network by 2015.
Mike Z is probably investing his entire NT severance and bonii (sp?) in NT stock as I type this.
But. Leave it to Cisco to try and diminish this major accomplishment by sowing fear, and even enter ones name into their database to experience it
But LTE could be facing strong competition from Sprint and Clearwire, which already have live WiMax networks in multiple markets. While it has a lower theoretical downlink limit, WiMax networks are already delivering DSL-like speeds to users on the go. Additionally, WiMax may be getting a big push from cable companies that want to provide their customers with mobile services.
LTE Vs. WiMax won't be the typical winner-take-all showdown. Learn what each brings to the race (registration required).
Ericsson Goes on the Offensive
Since Ericsson purchased Nortel’s CDMA wireless business and LTE R&D unit, it has been taking the Muhammad Ali-like rope-a-dope approach while Research in Motion has been flailing away trying to convince everyone that the deal should be reviewed because it’s not of “national interest”.
Lost in the hyperbole, emotion and political lobbying is a few important facts:
1. The CDMA business is a slow-dying dinosaur as GSM and new technologies such as LTE become increasingly popular.
2. Ericsson employs about 2,000 people in Canada, and it invested $126-million on R&D in Canada in 2008.
In summary, Ericsson isn’t buying an asset of “national interest”, and Ericsson is a good Canadian corporate citizen.
And after letting RIM control the “ring” for the past month, Ericsson is finally coming out swinging. In an interview with the Globe & Mail, Ericsson Canada president Mark Henderson said:
“We have been surprised that the position Ericsson has had in Canada this long, and some of these other messages that we have tried to clarify – about what the deal is really composed of and what the net benefits are of the transaction – have been sort of lost in the mix.
Prediction: The Canadian government will not review the Ericsson-Nortel deal. It makes for sexy news when there’s not a lot happening but that’s about it.