Siemens Phone Systems

Mobile phone operator Nokia and phone system manufacturer Siemens have announced that they may be interested in private equity investment for the Nokia Siemens Networks joint venture.

Nokia Siemens Networks provides networking equipment however, since its inception three years ago, it has been a massive financial burden on both Nokia and Siemens.

This is the first ever time that both companies have considered selling a stake of the business to a private equity company. However, Siemens and Nokia will be waiting until the economic downturn truly lifts before considering any companies.

Siemens AG, industrial conglomerate and maker of business phone systems, has said that it will be cutting around 4200 jobs. The jobs will be cut from its information technology unit SIS and will affect worldwide Siemens information technology units. Siemens has said that the job cuts will be made by 2011.

Around half of those job losses will be in Germany and the company has said that where possible, it will try to make mutual arrangements with employees or simply not renew existing contracted employees. Siemens also added that it will invest around €500 million in the information technology division.

Siemens, manufacturer of the Siemens phone system, is rumoured to be thinking about selling its information technology operations. However, a report from a Siemens spokeswoman has said that Siemens is simply thinking about taking the information technology operations division in a new direction. Reports that a possible IPO (Initial Public Offering) or sale (following staff restructuring) could be on the cards, were not commented on.

The Chief Executive of Siemens Peter Löscher has released a statement detailing his thoughts on the recession and recovery. In the statement he emphasises the fact that European economic recovery is exceedingly fragile and he also states that there is a decoupling of expectations and the reality.

Löscher believes that it will take years for the market to return to a stable state – this year saw a 9% drop in industrial production which indicates the heights the industry will have to scale to re-reach the production levels of 2007.

Siemens have suffered hefty losses in the recession and are currently bracing themselves for what is sure to be a difficult year in 2010.

Siemens have reached a settlement with former CEO Heinrich von Pierer after a long battle over Pierer’s alleged bribery scandal. The €5 million (around £4.5 million) damages was lowered by €1 million (around £909,562) and will be paid by Pierer to avoid legal action. The CEO after Pierer, Klaus Kleinfeld, will also have to pay damages of €2 million (around £1.8 million).

Siemens had to face the largest scandal in the history of the company, with accusations of Siemens top employees paying bribes to win contracts from different countries officials. Both Kleinfeld and Pierer deny any wrong doing.

Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) has decided to diverge from the telecoms market a little in order to enter the energy sector. Although telecoms are to be the main focus of NSN, the phone system equipment maker is currently looking for partners in order to cater for the spike in demand for renewable energy, smart metering and intelligent power grids.

NSN has recently announced its scheme to merge its five separate businesses into three – Business Solutions, Global Services and Network Systems. Under this new scheme, the energy sector of NSN will fall under the Business Solutions category.

NSN has already made a start niggling its way into the energy sector; it has recently won a contract to provide its Open Element Management System (EMS) to ServusNet, a software company based in Ireland that enables wind farms to optimise power generation.

Zain, an African and Middle Eastern carrier has announced a new deal with Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN). The deal comprises of three outsourced networks in Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya and involves modernising, optimising and managing 3,000 mobile sites. In light of the deal, 350 Zain workers will transfer to NSN and NSN will also be charged with implementing new energy efficient technologies.

The beginning of the week saw an announcement by Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) that they had lost the bid for Nortel Networks Corp’s optical networking and carrier Ethernet division.

NSN said that they had offered a bid that signified fair value for the division, however it failed to beat a bid put in by Ciena who won the auction. Nortel reportedly said last month that Ciena’s bid would be a stalking horse offer for its assets.