Ciena CFO: Alcatel-Lucent Merger "A Good Thing"

On Ciena's (CIEN) Fiscal 3Q conference call, CFO Joseph R. Chinnici comments on a possible merger between Alcatel (ALA) and Lucent (LU):

Simon Leopold - Morgan Keegan

Thanks, I wanted to ask you maybe a bit more of a philosophical question. If you could to talk to two different scenarios, one is Alcatel and Lucent agree to merge, how that affects the competitive landscape for you, and then the second scenario is that if their merger gets voted down what that does to competitive environment for Ciena. Thanks.

Joseph R. Chinnici-CFO

It’s an interesting philosophical question, Simon. I think generally speaking you know, I think it’s good for the industry you know, the consolidation there I think you know that certainly it’s going to be a challenging integration for them. You know, and I think if you were to summarize it any confusion is good for us. About the -- you know, if they were to merge you know, this is only probably going to be the good degree of confusion going on with the best life plans. And if they don’t that’s going to be confusing too because I think you know, what we are not focused -- started planning on the basis of the merger. So you know, all confusion amongst that competitive is a good thing for us to grab market share. And you know, I think you got lot of customers saying you know, if the merger does happen, this potentially opens up a landing slot, to use an airline parlance, where they want some diversification of customer base.

Simon Leopold - Morgan Keegan

But is it fair to say that what's in Ciena’s best interest is for the merger to complete?

Joseph R. Chinnici

You know, Simon, I wouldn’t sort of -- you know, I wouldn’t conclude that. I’d say you know, genuinely in the big picture of things not hugely impactfully the way but you know, our ongoing consolidation I think is generally good for the industry you know, having said that if you want to really get philosophical about it I think that’s -- I think is a good thing.

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