Nortel: A Report Card On Ubiquitous Mobility

Nortel Networks has had its share of false starts in the enterprise mobile infrastructure space. Nortel's Achilles' heel is the lack of product development control over its current wireless LAN (WLAN) product set due to an OEM partnership with Trapeze Networks. Recent announcements by Nortel to take development of its enterprise WLAN products in-house and re-address the enterprise mobility infrastructure market with 802.11n products are promising. Nortel faces stiff competition from two other strategic vendors in ubiquitous mobility solutions — Motorola and Cisco — and both have stronger positions than Nortel in this emerging market. Nortel needs to quickly ramp up its 802.11n product development — ideally via acquisition — and create multi-network-point solutions, messaging, and product sets to succeed in the ubiquitous mobility market.