Alcatel and Lucent to Merge 174
Cappella writes "It is confirmed. Alcatel and Lucent are combining to form a USD $25 billion entity. This marks a new wave of telecommunications company consolidation in the next few months to come." They first tried to work out a merger five years ago, but finally, at long last, it's come to fruition.
AT&T (Score:5, Funny)
So maybe my LU stock will finally rise??? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:AT&T (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:AT&T (Score:4, Funny)
Don't worry. The US branch would be called Freedom Electric.
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
Is this another AFD prank?
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
If you ever go to Harbor Freight Tools, take a look at the brands sometime. Everything is from China, but they're all named things like "Chicago Power Tools" or "American Air Compressors."
Re: (Score:2)
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
harbor freight (Score:2)
I assumed it was because they were near the harbor, and sold freight that came off the boat.
Maybe I'm being too logical here, but it sorta makes sense.
Now, they're everywhere, so the colorado stores aren't so logically named.
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
Think I'll stay away from that place.
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
Re:AT&T (Score:2)
Re:AT&T (Score:2, Informative)
Re: Western Electric (Score:2)
When the original AT&T / Lucent / NCR splitup happened, I spoke to my company's AT&T sales rep, asking why they didn't just use the Western Electric name for what was becoming Lucent. She said it was because, essentially, the existing associations of the name made it impossible. I am not sure now whether she meant it would violate some FTC rule, or if the bosses at AT&T wanted a very clean break with the past.
Bets On The New Name (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Bets On The New Name (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Bets On The New Name (Score:2)
Re:Bets On The New Name (Score:2)
> Lucent name.
You're right about Alcatel being an abbreviation of an older name, but I believe they're planning on changing the name. According to publicly available information, at their conference call [alcatel.com], they will provide more details, but they said
Re:Bets On The New Name (Score:2)
Re:Bets On The New Name (Stating the Obvious) (Score:2)
Re:Bets On The New Name (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Bets On The New Name (Score:2, Funny)
Would you call this fruition?! (Score:5, Insightful)
From article: Close to 9,000 jobs, or about 10% of the companies' workforce will lose their jobs as a result of the merger.
If I was a marketing person I would definitely try to side-step this fact, unless I sugar-coated it by saying how this makes the company more efficient.
Re:Would you call this fruition?! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Would you call this fruition?! (Score:3, Funny)
Any MOTHER FUCKING QUESTIONS?
Thank you.
sort of like Homer's catdog (Score:1, Funny)
Now Lucent is a foreign company (Score:3, Informative)
Well, I guess we can't trust the French either. I wonder why there isn't a bigger issue made out of this considering the Dubai Ports World deal last month.
Re:Now Lucent is a foreign company (Score:5, Informative)
My previous employer got bought out by the Swiss, and our Defense Team became a separate corporation owned by the parent company. It's standard operating procedure.
Re:Now Lucent is a foreign company (Score:2)
> that the parent company is not allowed to work with
I'm not sure about "shell company", but Alcatel has a U.S.-based subsidiary that is set up to handle sensitive items like this called Alcatel Government Solutions [alcatelgov.com]
Re:Now Lucent is a foreign company (Score:2)
Associated Press [ap.org]
Screw the French (Score:1, Flamebait)
Re:Why? (Score:4, Informative)
http://money.cnn.com/services/tickerheadlines/djh
http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_i
http://www.e-nough.hmdnsgroup.com/archives/001024
wtf? (Score:2, Funny)
Common... you're really going to say "fruition"?
Naperville (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Naperville (Score:2)
Oh goody! (Score:4, Funny)
Layoffs for all! Bonuses and parties for the rest! THERE'S CAKE IN THE CONFERENCE ROOM!
Re:Oh goody! (Score:2)
Bullshit. Recent mortgages will be the first to go. There's nothing some asscrack lying rat fuck loves more than yanking the paycheck out from under a picket fence. They're fucking over everyone and people actually sit here and say "oh it's the free market."
Free market my crotch.
We sure hope they "get" plan9 (Score:2, Funny)
"Plan 9 from Bell Labs" the only OMG!!! Ponies OS. [typepad.com]
Seriously, we (the plan9 community - there could be up to 100 of us!) sure hope they "get" plan9.
Re:We sure hope they "get" plan9 (Score:2)
But we do live in fear for when the oxygen supply runs out.
We worry about what crappy place we will end up in, where Windows & Linux is the only choice for your new hardware.
Re:We sure hope they "get" plan9 (Score:2)
Did you mean this to be funny?
Worrying about Oxygen running out, and the Inferno dying with Plan 9. Am I the only one laughing?
...yes, I know I am - I'm the one with shares of stock that I didn't sell while Lucent was at $80+. The laughter is the cure to melancholy. Maybe they'll be worth more than $3 sometime soon. :P
Try Alcacent sir (Score:3, Funny)
Alcatel and Lucent to Merge, form Voltron (Score:2, Funny)
Lets see, what do these guys do...
make "winmodems"
produce crappy PBX hardware
offer "services"
3) lose money!
Re: Alcatel and Lucent to Merge, form Voltron (Score:4, Informative)
Re: Alcatel and Lucent to Merge, form Voltron (Score:2)
no, no, NO. Why people are so stupid to realize that 1) in the USA, the MAXIMUM speed of a modem is 53kbps, so you will NEVER see a link connection faster than this and 2) don't know the difference between carrier speed and terminal speed?
ok, your computer communicates to the modem at a "fixed" rate, the fastest is 115200 bps (terminal speed). However the carrier speed on a 56k modem could be anything from 300~53000 bps(carrier speed). Why the ne
Saves on incest costs.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I do suspect this will lead to a lot of layoffs however. Do they really need 2 wireless divisions doing exactly the same thing?
Re:NOT exactly the same thing! (Score:2)
Talking to people I used to work with at Newbridge before Alcatel bought them out, Lucent should expect practically everything to be shelved, anything that is good will be moved over to Alcatel's existing workers and layoffs for the Lucent types.
Sounds like Alcatel is 1 smal
Re:NOT exactly the same thing! (Score:2)
my $0.02 Worth from a former employee of Lucent (Score:5, Insightful)
If were a cartoonist, this is the cartoon I would draw.
Frame #1: A fat PHB with the Red lucent symbol on his back, he is screwing an employee with the caption of "It's just business"
Frame #2: A french executive from Alcatel is screwing the fat PHB from the first frame with the caption of "How do you like it?"
The red lucent symbol will always remind me of how my ass felt after the management had their way with me. No romance, no dinner, no flowers, just a royal pounding in the ASCII chart!
Re:my $0.02 Worth from a former employee of Lucent (Score:2)
I believe that is properly referred to as "The coffee stain of quality".
Re:my $0.02 Worth from a former employee of Lucent (Score:2)
Re:my $0.02 Worth from a former employee of Lucent (Score:2)
Another fish to be fried (Score:2, Insightful)
Whoever put the whocares tag (Score:2)
Re:Whoever put the whocares tag (Score:2)
Confirmed? (Score:2)
--Rob
Does Bush know? (Score:3, Interesting)
Back at the beginning of Clinton's first term, lobbyists from Western Electric alerted him that the White House switchboard was a product of Northern Telecom. NorTel is nominally a Canadian company but this particular switch was made by its Raleigh, N.C. plant that employed 20,000 American workers and was installed by an American company.
Clinton had the system ripped out and replaced by a good ole Western Electric product. Lucent is the successor company to Western Electric. Unless the something has changed in the intervening years, the French now control the White House telecom system.
Re:Does Bush know? (Score:2)
So much for the Lucent brand (Score:2)
everybody's equipment is schytty (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:5, Insightful)
-Charles
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:3, Interesting)
Oh yeah. Now that's free market capitalism at it's best! What? No, that's what "free market" means: shit all over the wage earners.
Now they can start figuring out ways to fuck over customers.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Efficient:
Workers: Out on their ass
Resources: In some hairpiece's pocket.
Allocated.
Apparently Lucent isn't an efficient place to allocate workers to, thus the market has moved them elsewhere.
According to the people who are firing 9,000 workers for no reason.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
I know! They got FIRED because they don't have any marketable skills! Right?! Why'd they get hired in the first place? WHY DO THEY ALWAYS HAVE TO FIRE PEOPLE AND FUCK UP THEIR LIVES??
I think there should be a law: if a company that is not in Chapter 7 fires anyone without cause, they should become instantly liable for all of their debts. We'll call it the "Lying Rat Fuck Sphincter Clutch Act" Oh, and it's perfectly fair. Look up "breach of contract." See how many fucking layoff parties happ
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
If you're such a fan of compulsory employment, take a look at how that's working out for the French.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
You know, the reason everything is so fucked up is because all arguments become "the left" and "the conservatives" and the whatever. Meanwhile, it's perfectly alright for 9,000 people to have their lives rammed into a toilet for doing nothing other than a good job.
There is less of a need for workers at Lucent now than when those workers were hired.
Is there less of a need for house payments?
Why keep someone around doing nothing when they could t
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
The reason that everything is so "fucked up" is that the world is subject to change. Things aren't nearly stable enough for you to expect to be able to sit in the same place doing the same thing for 40-50 years. At some point, either the place you
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Oh horseshit. Our entire society is set up for people to have a "career" until they retire. Only reason they don't is because business seems to think firing people every 18 months is "good for the economy" which is a euphemism for "good for management."
Most of the pony express riders did a very go
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Firing people isn't good or bad for the economy, it is a product of the current state of a company's market. Demand does not stay constant, and thus the production level of a firm does not remain constant. This persecution complex about management acting sole
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Hey, way to patronize. If you'll look waaaaaaaay up at about 40,000 feet, perhaps you'll see the point.
If you are a hard working, college educated person, and haven't been able to establish a big enough safety net to make it to the next job without becoming destitute, it says something about your lack of fiscal responsibility.
Yep. Management never has to justify. Management never has to give a reason. Management is free
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Says management.
It might increase overall profits if the person's work wasn't worth as much as their salary, but firing someone who's work is actually worth something will actually lose you money.
And management cares because?
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
No they don't. They don't care if they lose money. They don't care about anything except control. They want controlled slaves. They don't want employees, because that would require responsibility. They want infinite profits at zero risk and they don't want competent employees. The merger story is proof.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Good question. Maybe the managers that are laying of 9000 people for no reason have an answer.
Oh, and congratulations. You just made my point.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
You keep saying that the layoffs are happening for no reason. My argument here is that there is a reason: the benefits of employing those 9000 people do not outweigh the cost of keeping them employed. Just because the company *could* hold onto the workers (you seem to suggest that management should take a pay cut) does not mean that the company *should* hold onto the workers. Whether the money surfaces to pay them
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
They are. If the seperate companies found those employees to "make them money" (since it seems sooooo important that every single person in the company be shoveling cash into the company account), then there is no reason that those employees can't make the combined companies money.
But management will put zero effort into retaining those people. They'll just throw them out on their asses before the ink dries on the merger paperwork, because firin
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Because I don't automatically agree that middle management knows best. Everyone's happy as long as people are being fired. Anyone who complains that those people are being treated like dogshit is "bitter and narrow-minded."
Whatever.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Funny how you say that when Alcatel is French. (mind you I don't necessarily disagree with what you are saying)
Now let's do something about this housing bubble, I want to buy a house...
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
france has such laws on the books. Look how well it's working for them...can you say "20%+ unemployment," boys and girls? If you make it impossible to fire potentially shiftless/lazy employees, you make it much more attractive to sidest
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Fifty percent of working-age adults in the U.S. are not employed in full-time "permanent" jobs.
Fifty.
Percent.
If you make it impossible to fire potentially shiftless/lazy employees
Shiftless/lazy employee: Anyone who is not a powerless, hungry, indebted, fearful, easily controlled slave.
to sidestep that problem by simply not hiring them in the first place.
Yep. Employers get the guarantees. Employees get the debts. Unfair.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
As the AC said, where's your source? As of February 2006, unemployment was at 4.8%. My source is here [bls.gov]. Put up or shut up.
Are you sure that chip on your shoulder isn't what's keeping you ou
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Bureau of Labor Statistics.
NEXT!
As of February 2006, unemployment was at 4.8%.
Meaning 4.8% of the workforce is drawing unemployment benefits. That statistic says nothing about people who have exhausted their benefits, are working part-time, or as temps, or are self-employed but not drawing a paycheck or have given up entirely.
Notice "unemployment" has been at or around 5% for about 300 years? It's a meaningless number. Utterly meaningless.
If I were in a position to have any say in th
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Where's your URL? Are you too lazy to google for it, or are we supposed to just take you at your word? Besides, my own cite (also from BLS) said otherwise.
YOU FAIL IT.
If your mindset wasn't of the glass-half-empty variety, you would see that as 95.2% of the working-age population is gainfully employed. There's almost always some num
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Uh, there's no URL for this one, Sparky. It requires people to think.
or are we supposed to just take you at your word?
I don't give a fuck what you do.
If your mindset wasn't of the glass-half-empty variety, you would see that as 95.2% of the working-age population is gainfully employed.
No. I would see that 95.2% of the working-age population is not drawing unemployment benefits. At least read the statistics. It helps a lot.
and then there are jobsworths like you who wonder why they can't
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Every business fires talented, smart people.
These people are not you.
Good. I don't have a lying phone-flipping rat fuck asscrack manager, so I don't have to worry about being laid off the week after I sign a mortgage. And I can do the work of ten dockers-wearing air-conditioned fuckwads under budget and under schedule before Corn Flakes. Face it. Donut-stuffing middle management doesn't have the huevos to bring products to market and employ people
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Uh huh. That's convenient. So now we can dismiss all of the unfairly fucked over former employees by saying "hey, you must not want a job, because this number says you don't."
Pure, fragrant bullshit.
You ignore people who choose to stay at home
The number includes:
1. Part-time workers
2. Temporary workers
3. Self-employed
4. Out of the work force entirely
And it is an accurate number. Fifty percent are non-full-
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
I certainly could, but it'd have nothing to do with France, which has a little bit less than 10% unemployment.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
People get hired now? Where?
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
190k people got hired last month [bloomberg.com]. That brings the total for the quarter to 603k new hires.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Good. That should about cover the people who were fired last quarter. (Note the only actual employer mentioned was Kia, a non-U.S. company) What about wage growth?
Oops! Article doesn't mention that. Back to you, Bob!
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
All of that is happening now.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
When it all crashed, they were left with a crapload of never used, but used equipment. Cisco was smart -- they bought all theirs up and warehoused it. Lucent liquidated it, which totally decimated their new equipment sales. Why buy new when used is
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2, Insightful)
If any company had anything resembling world domination, it was them.
The irony is that at that time Govt. broke the company up to 7 segments, and now they are trying to survive by merging.
Fall from grace, indeed.
Re:How long can this consolidation go on for ? (Score:2)
Of the seven "Baby Bells", Bell Atlantic gobbled up NYNEX and then merged with GTE to form Cingular. Southwestern Bell renamed itself SBC and gobbled up Pacific Telesys and then Ameritech, U S WEST got bought by QWEST, and now SBC has gobb