Turin Networks is newest Ciena partner

Ciena has invested in and will resell the equipment of Turin Networks, according to a source close to one of the companies, adding one more name to a long list of Ciena’s vendor partners, some of which it eventually acquired.

In August, Ciena’s chief financial officer Joe Chinnici attributed a $112 million sequential decrease in the company’s cash to, among other things, $5.5 million in "private company investments." When asked about that private company, which Chinnici referred to only as a "West Coast organization," he said, "We are going to partner with them. We’re going to sell the product for them, and we’ve got a lot of other clauses in the contract similar to what we’ve done before [with other partners]. You’ll be hearing more about that in quarters to come."

A source told Telephony today that that "West Coast organization" is Turin, which is headquartered in Petaluma, Calif. Neither Ciena nor Turin were immediately available for comment.

Formed in 1999, Turin offers a multiservice provisioning platform (MSPP) that handles Ethernet over Sonet and SDH traffic and adds crossconnect functionality. It has reported steady success with North American independent operating companies such as Vermont Telephone and Grand River Mutual as well as Japan’s NTT Communications. Turin’s last funding announcement came in January 2002, when a $58-million third round took the company’s total funding to $130 million.

Turin has distribution partnerships with Motorola and UTStarcom. While Ciena perhaps offers greater inroads among some North American carriers than those two, Turin’s platform could give Ciena a better MSPP than the Metrodirector K2, which Ciena gained from acquiring Cyras in 2001. That product "really hasn’t taken off as well as some other platforms in the market," said Anna Reidy, senior analyst with Mariner Analytical. "Turin has gotten some really good reception from their product."

"It does seem like it may be more of a plus for Ciena then for Turin," Reidy said.

Ciena invested in another MSPP vendor, Luminous Networks, in September 2003. But Luminous CEO Chris Stark told Telephony the corresponding reseller agreement has not resulted in much sales.

"Ciena continues to have their hands full integrating the acquisitions and the partnerships they have," Reidy said. "To jump into another one while the existing partnerships are still being worked out is a bit risky."