Nortel North America president resigns

The president of Nortel Networks’ North American operations will resign at the end of this month, the company announced late Wednesday.

A 12-year veteran of the company, Dion Joannou was named North American president in September 2005, having previously been president of the Caribbean and Latin America. He was named chief strategy officer in October 2004 amid a larger corporate realignment administered by previous Chief Executive Officer Bill Owens.

“Details surrounding Joannou's successor are being finalized and will be announced at a later date,” Nortel said in a statement, adding that Joannou left “to pursue other personal interests.”

Nortel’s revenue from the United States, by far its biggest market, was up 2% from a year earlier and down nearly 4% sequentially to less than $1.2 billion in the second quarter.

Nortel’s chief financial officer resigned in February, its chief ethics officer resigned last November. In July it named a new chief information officer.

“We believe these departures continue to signal ongoing organizational flux,” UBS Investment Research analyst Nikos Theodosopoulos wrote in a note this morning. “Not a particularly encouraging sign at this stage in the company's transformation.”