Alcatel and Tropic win SBC ROADM bid, says RBC

Alcatel has won a coveted metro optical networking contract with SBC Communications by partnering with start-up Tropic Networks, said RBC Capital Markets in a research note issued this morning.

Tropic has not officially announced any formal partnership with Alcatel.

SBC’s metro networking plans employ reconfigurable add-drop multiplexing (ROADM) technology, a specialty of Tropic’s that allows carriers to provision wavelengths remotely using software management systems, said RBC. The contract could be worth between $500 million and $700 million over the next several years, RBC estimated, with $300 million to $400 million of that for equipment alone.

Lucent Technologies, with Movaz Networks as its partner, was said to be pursuing the SBC contract along with Cisco Systems, which announced in June that its ONS 15454 multiservice provisioning platform would include ROADM technology in the third quarter of this year. Nortel Networks, said to be competing for the SBC business as well, is also in the process of adding ROADM capabilities to its products.

When Photuris Networks ceased operations in March 2004, the ROADM start-up vendor’s co-founder and vice president of product marketing, Ashish Vengsarkar, hinted that his company’s falling out of the running for the SBC contract was one of the final nails in its corporate coffin.

"My sense is that a known partner, even with an unknown technology, was more acceptable than a known technology with an unknown partner," Vengsarkar said in March. Photuris’ assets were acquired in May by Mahi Networks, where Vengsarkar is now vice president of global market development.