The winner of Nortel Networks' remaining assets is: Genband, the company that submitted a stalking horse bid for the company's Carrier VoIP and Application Solutions Business (CVAS) last year. The net purchase price is about $182 million.
Previously, plans called for commencing an auction for the business this week, but Dow Jones reports no other bids came in by Tuesday's deadline, making it the first of Nortel's businesses that didn't draw multiple bidders.
It marks Genband's fourth major acquisition in five years. The deal will combine Nortel's softswitch, media gateway and application technologies with Genband's next-generation media, session and security gateway technologies.
As a result of the acquisition, no other supplier will be better positioned to enable service providers a more cost effective means to optimize their existing fixed TDM networks and transition from fixed TDM to IP and from fixed to mobile convergence, Genband President and CEO Charles Vogt said in a press release.
Genband has teamed with One Equity Partners (OEP) and other existing shareholders to secure the Nortel assets. The sale is subject to court approvals in the United States and Canada. Nortel's ambition is to close the sale in the second quarter.
Nortel representatives were at Mobile World Congress (MWC) last week to meet with customers and drum up support for the CVAS business.
Also at MWC, Genband announced its support for the GSMA Voice over LTE (VoLTE) initiative as a standard way of delivering voice and messaging services for LTE.
Genband says it offers an IMS product portfolio that supports legacy access migration, IP access, media adaptation, IP interworking and PSTN interconnection and has significant traction with Tier 1 operators worldwide