Fahrenheit OSS

It was reported/rumored this week that SAIC has put its prized telecom possession, Telcordia Technologies, up for sale (see story below).

The question on many minds, besides the speculative sport of guessing how much it would fetch--if the report is true--is "Why?"

Most people will never hear a satisfactory answer to that question. Not from SAIC. Not from Telcordia CEO Matt Desch, nor his management team, nor spokespeople. Not even from the analyst community. But it's not because these sources won't supply the answers. They might, eventually. And likely even honest ones. But too many people still won't hear them. They'll hear what they want to hear.

Telcordia has the distinction in the OSS space--and the entire telecom sector, for that matter--of being a company that everyone thinks they know better than everyone else. Everyone who has ever passed through the technical side of telecom has either been trained by, certified by, worked for or competed with Telcordia (once Bellcore) or was an end-user of Telcordia software.

And it seems everyone knows at least one disgruntled ex-employee that can give him or her the real scoop or fill in the blanks on what they already think they know. So everyone is already forming an opinion. But maybe there is no real scoop. Maybe it's just business. Maybe SAIC no longer sees a strategic fit. Hell, who wants to dabble in telecom when you have all that cool, underworld government stuff going on?

Maybe investors see, and SAIC sees that they see, something behind Telcordia's next-generation product portfolio that makes them believe it will fetch a good price. The sale price, if there truly is one, will answer that question. But that won't stop the conspiracy theorists.

Our predilection for conspiracy theories in this country and this industry has grown unnerving over the last few years. And with Telcordia once being the kind of company some people loved to hate (although Desch has done a good job of converting many doubters), the usual rumors about internal strife when companies go on the block, to say nothing of the suggestions about Desch's ties to the Freemasons and membership in Skull & Bones, have begun. (Note: he graduated from Ohio State and the University of Chicago.)

If Telcordia is truly for sale, there really is only one way to get to the bottom of this story and satisfy everyone's curiosity. We need the aid of Michael Moore. Perhaps we should commission a documentary. "Fahrenheit OSS"? That will get at the truth.

E-mail me at tmcelligott@primediabusiness.com