Nortel said the decision was made “in light of ongoing discussions with interested parties”. The company expects to provide a further update on the auction process and sale of these businesses next week.

“Completion of this first large-scale divestiture is a major milestone in Nortel’s plan to preserve the value of its innovation and know-how while maximizing value through the sale of its businesses,” Pavi Binning, Nortel’s chief restructuring officer, said in a press release. (Editor’s Note: Now, that’s a cool job title!)

“As we stated following July’s auction, the sale of our CDMA business and LTE Access assets to Ericsson represents a very positive prospect for our customers, our employees and for many of our other stakeholders. Our customers will benefit from having an experienced and financially strong partner supporting their CDMA and future LTE networks, while more than 2,500 skilled employees will now have new opportunities with a world-class technology company.”

Avaya also received regulatory clearance for the proposed deal from the Canadian Competition Bureau. The Competition Bureau issued a no action letter, which suggests it does not have grounds to challenge the proposed transaction under the Competition Act.

Avaya expects to close the acquisition next month.

Source: press release

- Nov. 13: The auction for the metro Ethernet networking business is scheduled to take place, although there are reports it could be delayed to give potential bidders more time to prepare offers.

- Nov. 16: The company’s third-quarter results will be unveiled – not that it matters much but it will provide some more insight into how the business has deteriorated as customers scatter to rivals.

- Nov. 20: The auction of the GSM business happens.

According to Bloomberg, the company could be looking to extend the deadline to sell MEN to give bidders more time to put together a deal. Right now, the only offer for MEN has come from Ciena, which has bid $390-million in cash and 10 million shares, which are trading at $12.20 each.

“One thing that’s telling is that all the previous deals were all-cash deals,suggesting that the interest for this business may not have been that strong,” Ari Bensinger , an analyst at Standard & Poor’s, told Bloomberg.

Another interesting issue is whether Nortel’s demise will have a major effect on Canada’s startup landscape. In Canada – and probably many countries around the world – one of the great offshoots has been Nortel employees who have left the fold to create their own startups. Armed with experience and expertise, these entrepreneurs have played a key role in fuelling the start-up landscape, even though they might not get the attention that highlights their time with Nortel.

When Nortel disappears, not only will the company disappear but, sadly, the flow of entrepreneurs coming from the corporate mothership. The question is who will replace Nortel as the corporate entity that will spawn entrepreneurs?

Will employees from Research in Motion fill the start-up gap? How about Microsoft Canada or Ericsson or Nokia or Open Text?

Any thoughts?

More more on Nortel’s startup legacy, check out James Bagnall’s story in the Ottawa Citizen.

As the Nortel saga draws to a close, I am constantly surprised that there are people still considering purchasing Nortel hardware. Worse yet are the number of dealers still selling the hardware to the unsuspecting customer.

Notice I said “unsuspecting”. Unsuspecting means “uninformed” customer. As long as there is complete disclosure on Nortel’s current situation by the selling dealer, then fine. Go ahead and pitch the product. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case.

With the Avaya / Nortel deal imminent (like weeks away), I am even more surprised by this email from a fairly large Nortel Authorized Stocking Distributor which landed in my email on November 9th, 2009. It states the following:

Nortel EDGE Promo Now Extends to Avaya Resellers
Nortel is currently offering a special “Nortel EDGE” promotion to its partners. The promotion provides an additional 20% discount off the regular reseller cost of its data products. Although it is currently scheduled to expire in December, it may be extended. We would encourage you to take advantage of this program as it will help to make you price competitive with most current Nortel VARs.

Expire. In December. This special offer expires in December ! Of course this offer expires in December. Nortel expires in December !

And more:

So that you can benefit from this 20% discount, we have worked with Nortel and have put in place a “shortcut” to get you signed up as a limited type of Nortel Partner. Under this “Get Started” program you will simply need to fill in a few fields in a form and forward it to Nortel for review and approval.

Shortcut – Of course there’s a shortcut. If they offered their normal 2 month dealer registration period then the receivers would be stuck with the hardware !

And then even better is this line – “limited” type of Nortel Partner – like how about a 3 week limit ?

Nortel – Official Site
Reliable Info – 100% Transparent
Visit the Official Site Now!

Being a curious type, I clicked on the ad, and discovered it’s a Web site (next.nortel.com) for Nortel’s enterprise solutions business, which has been acquired by Avaya.

Some of the headlines are eye-catching:

“Your Nortel Investment is Safe”
“There’s Never Been a Better Time to Buy”

There’s also links to Nortel’s Buzzboard blog, Twitter and its Facebook Page. Clearly, some people have been doing a lot of work preparing for life post-Nortel.

Note: Here’s the story in the Ottawa Citizen about Roth, who desperately wanted out of Nortel in 2001 after a 30-year career with Nortel.

Roth retired to bucolic Caledon, Ont. with a $130-million (most of it from stock options that been steadily rewarded to him by Nortel’s generous board) where he has kept an extremely low profile.

One of the few interviews done with Roth was nabbed by The Street.com’s Scott Moritz, who somehow managed to get Roth to talk about why he decided to sell his last chunk in Nortel – 741.245 shares in August 2002 – for $744,260.

Roth retired to bucolic Caledon, Ont. with a $130-million (most of it from stock options that been steadily rewarded to him by Nortel’s generous board) where he has kept an extremely low profile.

One of the few interviews done with Roth was nabbed by The Street.com’s Scott Moritz, who somehow managed to get Roth to talk about why he decided to sell his last chunk in Nortel – 741.245 shares in August 2002 – for $744,260.