Nortel Networks Corp. announced Monday it is looking for a buyer for software that connects different carrier wireless networks.Toronto-basedNortel has been operatingunder bankruptcy protection since Jan. 14 and is sellingmost of its assets by auction. Avayarecently won an auction when it offered to buy the enterpriseassets for US$915 million, and LMEricsson of Sweden has agreed to buy its carrier wireless assets forUS$1.13 billion.What Ericsson is getting is mainlythe base stations for code division multiple access (CDMA) networks,plus licenses to use Nortel’s patents for Long Term Evolution networks.Thelatest technologies for sale are Nortel’s packet core assets. In courtdocuments, Nortel described these as “network components designed toprovide data network connectivity for 2G GPRS, 3G UMTS and 4G LTEwireless networks and increase network bandwidth for multimedia contentand applications over wireless networks …”The deadline for bids is Oct. 16 at 4:00 pm Eastern time.BothAvaya and Ericsson bought their respective Nortel assets duringauctions that started with “stalking horse” bids. The carrier wirelessauction started with a stalking horse bid in June from Nokia SiemensNetworks, which was prepared to take on 800 Nortel employees. In July,Avaya bid US$475 million for the enterprise assets, but had to increaseits offer to US$915 million because two other companies – rumoured tobe Siemens Enterprise Communications and MatlinPatterson – were willingto pay more.In a document filed with the U.S. bankruptcy court in Delaware, Nortel stated the packet core assets include:•
a Next Generation Gateway GPRS Support Node on ATCA; •
a Mobility Manager Element on ATCA; •
an AGW Serving Gateway on ATCA; •
an AGW Packet Data Gateway on ATCA; and •
a Network Element Manager associated with each of those components.
