{"id":548427,"date":"2006-04-03T16:15:39","date_gmt":"2006-04-03T16:15:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wordpress\/technology\/548427-alcatel-lucent-create-new-telecoms-giant.html"},"modified":"2006-04-03T16:15:39","modified_gmt":"2006-04-03T16:15:39","slug":"alcatel-lucent-create-new-telecoms-giant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/548427-alcatel-lucent-create-new-telecoms-giant.html","title":{"rendered":"Alcatel, Lucent create new telecoms giant"},"content":{"rendered":"

"Alcatel and Lucent Technologies today (Sunday) announced the signature of a merger agreement aimed at creating the world’s leader in communication solutions," said a joint statement released in Paris. <\/font><\/p>\n

According to sources close to the negotiations, Alcatel is to hold around 60% of the capital of the new company, while Lucent will have 40%. <\/font><\/p>\n

The newly formed group, to be based in Paris, had a combined turnover of around 21.0 billion euros ($25bn) for 2005, the statement said. <\/font><\/p>\n

With Alcatel worth about $20bn and Lucent slightly less than $13bn, their combined capitalisation would be near $33bn – creating the world’s second-biggest maker of equipment and networks for telephones and the Internet, almost equal with top producer Cisco Systems. <\/font><\/p>\n

"The key objective of this merger is to generate significant growth in revenue and results, by exploiting market opportunities in new generation networks, services and applications, while also carrying out important synergies," the statement said. <\/font><\/p>\n

"The size, the portfolio and the capacities of the new company will increase its value in the long term for shareholders, clients and employees," it added. <\/font><\/p>\n

The two companies, which had unsuccessfully attempted to merge in 2001, said last month they had started negotiations for a merger "between equals". <\/font><\/p>\n

The firms are highly complementary, engaged in similar activities providing equipment for fixed and mobile phones. <\/font><\/p>\n

Both offer so-called triple play Internet services – combining high-speed Internet, television and telephone – and quadruple play, which also includes wireless (mobile) services, as well as telephones both fixed and mobile and television, and are also working on new ideas on network renewal. <\/font><\/p>\n

One difference is that Alcatel is active in artificial satellites. <\/font><\/p>\n

Another difference that prompted merger interest is that Lucent is active mainly on the US market whereas Alcatel is in various European and Asian markets. <\/font><\/p>\n

The equipment-making arm of US giant AT and T which broke off and became independent in 1996, Lucent grew rapidly in the late 1990s until the technology bubble burst in 2002, when it almost went bankrupt. It has survived through thousands of layoffs and drastic budget cuts. <\/font><\/p>\n

In fiscal 2004, which ended September 30 2005, Lucent saw its net income slide 40.7% to 1.19 billion dollars with a 4.4% growth in sales to $9.44bn. <\/font><\/p>\n

Alcatel recorded a 61% increase in net profit for 2005 to 930 million euros ($1.12bn), based on a 7.3% increase in sales to 13.1 billion euros. Its strengths are its digital subscriber lines (DSL) and Internet Provider (IP) solutions. <\/font><\/p>\n

Alcatel was also hard hit by the bursting of the Internet and high-tech bubble. <\/font><\/p>\n

The telecommunications sector has been awash in consolidation deals lately. AT and T is gradually regaining its status prior to the 1984 dismantlement of its monopoly. After its recent takeover of SBC Communications Inc., this month it announced plans to buy BellSouth for $67bn. <\/font><\/p>\n

Inet-Bridge<\/font><\/i><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

French telecoms technology provider Alcatel and US equipment firm Lucent Technologies yesterday announced a merger agreement, creating a $33bn giant in global telecommunications. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-548427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548427"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=548427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548427\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=548427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=548427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=548427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}