Cisco mulls buying Nokia?

I had to check the date to make sure it wasn't really
April 1st....

A Reuters newswire article, via Yahoo! News, reports that:

[snip]

Cisco Systems Inc. is considering buying the world's top mobile handset maker Nokia in a bid to gain its wireless infrastructure technology, the Business newspaper reported on Sunday.

The paper, which did not reveal the source of its information, said U.S.-based Cisco had traditionally concentrated on acquisitions of niche technology players, but its Chief Executive John Chambers is believed to be interested in merging with a wireless infrastructure company.

"Nokia has been identified as the most likely target," the paper said.

Cisco, the largest maker of Internet equipment, is worth around $123 billion, while Nokia's market value is around $71 billion.

The paper said Cisco's mainstay networking market was fast changing with the convergence of fixed-line and wireless networks, and Cisco needed a merger to acquire the technology to create intelligent wireless applications, which Finnish-based Nokia could provide.

Cisco was not immediately available for comment. A Nokia spokeswoman in Helsinki declined to comment.

[snip]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050807/bs_nm/telecoms_cisco_nokia_dc

- ferg

Strange...

Explicit reference to how this would enable Cisco to gain
purchase into the wireless space, but no mention of the
impact on the popularity of Nokia platforms with a competing
firewall vendor, Check Point.

Any thoughts on VoIP?

ymmv,
--ra

On Sun, Aug 07, 2005 at 08:11:13PM +0000, Fergie (Paul Ferguson) said something to the effect of: