Ericsson's Deal for Nortel Very Much Alive

It is far too quiet on the Ericsson / Nortel / Research In Motion front. No move at the Court of Appeal, no media leaks, no scrums, no industry lobbying, no evidence of any activity on RIM’s part to create a “Canadian solution” for Industry Minister Tony Clement to consider.

This cannot be good for those of us who were so certain that the Federal Government would find a way to spirit Nortel’s LTE assets into RIM’s hands (see prior post “Ericsson’s deal for Nortel is DOA” July 28-09). They blocked the MDA division sale, after all, which is less integral to Canada’s Innovation Economy than Nortel is.

My theory was that if RIM would make the lenders whole relative to Ericsson’s purchase price, Minister Clement would be hard pressed to let the LTE patents escape Canadian ownership. The fact that Nortel claims to have “only licenced” the patents and not sold them was a nice finesse, but it was too transparent to decide the issue. As is the silly argument that the patent’s book value figure is too low to warrant Federal review (see prior post “Nortel’s “Alice in Wonderland” math” August 19-09).

The lack of any noise, whatsoever, can only mean that I was wrong. Sorry, readers, you get what you pay for here sometimes. Ericsson looks to be well placed to win the day.

Disclosure - I own RIM

Comments

[txfeinbergs:]

Given I am (well was, now Ericsson) employee, I am very glad you were wrong. You don't find many people admitting they were wrong though and apologizing these days, so you have earned a lot of respect from me for that.

Sep 11 10:05 AM

[JamesApple:]

Rim's days are over. Look at Waterloo, Ontario, it has turned into a complete ghost town, all aspirations for Rim are gone forever. Apple is clearning house on Rim. Nortel assets are in much better hands with Ericsson which is a far superior company than Rim can ever be. Rim itself should bankrupt no later than year 2013.

Sep 11 06:57 PM

[Wireless Wiz:]

Is this the only thing you ever write? This is just nonsense. Please write something that adds to the conversation for once.


On Sep 11 06:57 PM JamesApple wrote:

> Rim's days are over. Look at Waterloo, Ontario, it has turned into
> a complete ghost town, all aspirations for Rim are gone forever.
> Apple is clearning house on Rim. Nortel assets are in much better
> hands with Ericsson which is a far superior company than Rim can
> ever be. Rim itself should bankrupt no later than year 2013.

Sep 15 10:21 AM