£850m BT contract awarded to Marconi
Nortel Networks ditched from deal
Posted in Data Networking , 13th March 2001 16:14 GMT
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Marconi has announced a major coup for its networking business after it was selected as sole supplier for a major upgrade to BT's core network.
BT had previously planed to use both Marconi and Nortel Networks for the contract, which will be worth around £850 million over five years, but has now decided to source kit from Marconi alone. The deal means Marconi will supply BT with SDH (synchronous digital hierarchy) and optical DWDM (dense wave division multiplexing) equipment.
"Marconi and Nortel were in the frame but we've now decided the best structure for the deal was to put work to Marconi. Nortel has not been 'cold shouldered' and remains an important supplier for BT," a spokesman for the telco explained.
Loss of a lucrative slice of the BT contract will nonetheless be a bitter pill to swallow at Nortel, which last month announced a profits warning that was accompanied by the loss of 10,000 jobs. ®
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