Memo to Canada: Review Avaya-Nortel Deal Quickly

avaya-nortel-enterprise

Rewind two months. During the August 2009 CompTIA Breakaway conference in Las Vegas, multiple Nortel channel partners told The VAR Guy they were abandoning Nortel and looking for other vendor partners. The big winners in the room were Cisco Systems and Juniper.

Fast forward to the present, and plenty of Nortel partners are wondering what the future holds for Nortel’s enterprise business. Alas, red tape — otherwise known as the Canadian government — could potentially hold up the Avaya-Nortel enterprise combo. According to Canada’s Industry Minister Tony Clement in late September said: “We will be applying the net benefit to Canada test for the Avaya transaction.”

Net benefit? Huh?

Canada should applaud the fact that Avaya stepped in to bid for Nortel’s enterprise business before sales contracted even more. Time is short. Partners and customers are impatient. Canada should push the deal through or risk watching Nortel’s enterprise sales further contract.

The Other New Deal

With or without Nortel, the Avaya channel team continues to press forward. Watch for multiple announcements the week of Oct. 12. Avaya will be hosting a partner conference in Tennessee. The VAR Guy will be watching — and listening — closely.

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