Content area
Full Text
As I write this, the marriage between Lucent and Alcatel has just been called off.
Let's consider, though, the piecemeal parts that would have combined to make this new company and what impact it would have had on network users.
With only the benefit of my ever-- less-reliable memory, I count nine companies, the people, product or technologies that would have been included in the combined company. These are in addition to the nontrivial assets that the companies have developed on their own over the years.
In the LAN switching space, the product mix would include technology from LANNET, Prominet, Packet Engines and Xylan. (Lucent spun off the LANNET and Prominet product lines as part of Avaya last year but some remnants remain.)
For the WAN, Newbridge Networks and Ascend would contribute to the core, while Xedia and Assured Access dealt with...