I try to stay out of the war of words and campaigns to sell one box or solution over another and I don’t like revealing too many interconnect secrets just like you wouldn’t want to reveal company proprietary information that may allow your competitors an inside track to kick your butt. With that said, here’s one for the record.
There's been an awful lot said recently about Nortel, mostly bad. My Grandmother was pretty well meaning when she said, "honey, if you can't say anything nice about anyone then say nothing at all."
Nortel in the dog eat dog world of telecom was in fact a once, world-class company. Their products remain intact unlike a lot of junk coming from IT and other competitors with wares that don't pass the test of time unless you invest heavily in patch and change or upside down maintenance contracts (costs more than the gear). If anything can be said of Nortel, they did lead, make great products and left a legacy behind that is hard to follow. I'm not saying Nortel is dead or dying, but I would be disappointed, as would many of their users/customers if they exit telecommunications.
We still sell and support legacy Nortel gear. Maybe it's strategy, maybe it's retaining customers and moving them into something else later. There's the strategy. There's also been a lot of fanfare lately in the IPT arena about "beating Nortel." Over numerous years of selling, installing and servicing Nortel gear, I ask myself, "why would I do that?"
For other interconnects, VARs, dealers you certainly must be asking yourselves the same thing. Why would you want to "beat Nortel?"
Now for the interconnect secret.
Beat Nortel? Heck no. That's the furthest thing from my mind and has never been in the equation even when and while we sell other solutions. Beat Cisco! There you go, and I think we (like minded businesses) can and will in the SMB space. Now for the song we sing. To the tune of reliability, value and simplicity –these are the traits that retain the hearts of the SMB and no vendor knows that better than Nortel.
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