The Intel Corporation said it had hoovered up Ziatech, a telecomms kit company, for nearly a quarter of a billion dollars.

The privately held company manufacturers telecomms products, including circuit boards, for network and telephony infrastructure, and is the second such acquisition Intel has made in only five days.

The move is also part of Intel's cunning "building block" strategy, which will partly remove its dependence on microprocessors as its chief revenue generator.

Earlier this year, CEO Craig Barrett told The Register that the network infrastructure segement of Intel's business will be a significant contributor to its bottom line over the coming years.

Intel holds its Developer Forum starting next Monday, and can be expected to unveil several more such surprises during the course of the show.

It is systematically putting together parts which will allow it to become a major infrastructure player in the networking arena.

Current Ziatech customers include Nortel, Ericcson and Lucent. ®