back to article Alu Alu! Nokia gobbles French rival Alcatel-Lucent in €15.6bn deal

Nokia has today confirmed the completion of its €15.6bn (£11.5bn) gobble of French rival Alcatel-Lucent. Under the finalised deal, Nokia now holds nearly 80 per cent of outstanding ALU shares. The acquisition was announced in April, got European Union approval in July. Rajeev Suri, president and chief executive of Nokia, said …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

    Siemens now ALU...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

      Presumably Nokia can now cut costs and increase productivity by moving most of the ALU work from France to somewhere more cost effective that doesn't have a 35 hour working week and a retirement age of 60....

      1. JetSetJim

        Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

        They've also done this before with the Wireless division of Motorola back in 2010-11. Lots of cost savings to be had in rationalising product lines, but a big one-off cost of ensuring interoperability for when they have to swap out boxes in live networks, and then "training up" the new support operations in the low cost centres before canning the old ones.

        The main savings are probably going to be in the manufacturing area when they get around to combining all the duplicate product lines (if they can). It will be interesting to see which boxes they EOL and what impact that has on existing contracts.

        The USA has a big install base of ALU LTE, so that's going to need to be supported & maintained for a few years

      2. Peter Gordon

        Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

        Good luck moving anything from France. Closing French operations is really hard.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

          "Good luck moving anything from France. Closing French operations is really hard."

          Only because they all go on strike at the slightest excuse. However Nokia likely want the technology, patents and market share rather than the people. If the French walkout, Nokia can play hardball and just transfer the underlying work to a more civilised and cost effective location (like Vietnam, Poland, etc.)...

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

        "that doesn't have a 35 hour working week "

        Working week has little to do with productivity or efficiency. British and American bankers work long hours and their efforts have met with considerable downsides. I would rather have software and hardware designed by people who weren't overworked and permanently tired. Works for NASA.

        1. Dr_N

          Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

          Only if you don't follow the rules.

          Turning up on-site in France the day after an acquisition and expecting to be able to fire everyone just means you've not done due diligence on local employment regs.

          Follow the rules to the letter and it should go smoothly.

          Just don't put yourself in a potential hostage or shirt shredding situation.

          1. JetSetJim

            Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

            > Follow the rules to the letter and it should go smoothly.

            Hmm - while I agree with the sentiment, in practice, and in France, things go differently. ALU itself tried to make redundancies in France within the last 5 years - basically the second you announce it the whole company (in France), excluding senior management, goes on strike, and that impacts business operations significantly. Net result is that ALU had to dramatically scale back the cuts, and then dragged some offshore jobs into France to partially offset this (and this included the closure of some UK facilities). It's difficult to see how this could go smoothly.

        2. Len

          Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

          True. Britain has one of the lowest labour productivity stats of the developed world, certainly a lot lower than France. Just 'being visible' at work does not equal productivity. I know plenty of people who spend the last two hours at work on Facebook just because they can't be seen to be the first one to leave.

          I'm not sure if I'd want a 35 hour work week, but then, I'm a workaholic. If the French can get more done in 35 hours than the Brits in 45 more power to them!

          1. TheVogon

            Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

            "True. Britain has one of the lowest labour productivity stats of the developed world, certainly a lot lower than France"

            Per person the UK has a higher GDP than France. As per http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=PDB_LV

        3. Anonymous Coward
          FAIL

          Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

          British and American bankers work long hours and their efforts have met with considerable downsides...

          Oh puhleeze don't make me laugh. Long hours? Yeah in the upmarket expense fuelled boozers paid for by the mugs, sorry, customers, whilst they are cooking up another scheme to rip us off.

          And what downsides? Would be talking about worldwide recession and falling wages for everyone but the bankers?

          There is a reason that the word "bankers" rhymes with masturbation

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

            "Yeah in the upmarket expense fuelled boozers"

            That's usually after 12+ hours work in the office each day....

        4. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Finns gonna pay the fat redundancy cheques again

          "British and American bankers work long hours and their efforts have met with considerable downsides. "

          What planet are you talking about? On this one, the British and American banking industries are the largest and most profitable ones going...

  2. Dr Trevor Marshall

    I love the photograph chosen to head the article :)

  3. ratfox
    Angel

    Nokia moving into the mobile business again

    The first time want enough?

    1. TheOtherHobbes

      Re: Nokia moving into the mobile business again

      They're building another brand they can sell to Microsoft.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Nokia moving into the mobile business again

        "They're building another brand they can sell to Microsoft."

        Worked before, could work again.

        Nokia might have succeeded as an Android maker but they would have been rather similar to Samsung only without the fabs, I can't see it would have worked out. Although a lot of techies like myself wanted a "real" Linux phone, I think it would never have sustained a big volume business. It is just possible that the Nokia board had excellent advice and came up with a very cunning plan. I know a lot of Nokia diehards have a completely different narrative but, looking at what happened to BlackBerry, Nokia might have been right.

  4. Howard Hanek

    I Don't Think This Will End Well

    The time is rapidly approaching where the only thing the French will do well is insult tourists.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I Don't Think This Will End Well

      "The time is rapidly approaching where the only thing the French will do well is insult tourists."

      I have never been insulted as a tourist in France, even by Parisian waiters.

      I speak French, am polite, do not raise my voice unnecessarily and do not expect air conditioning in old hotels. It works every time.

      1. ratfox

        Re: I Don't Think This Will End Well

        I do think Paris waiters act somewhat less than polite, but I think Americans have especially high expectations, coming from a country where the staff constantly engages in ass-licking to get their tip.

      2. Mellipop

        Re: I Don't Think This Will End Well

        Someone (French) once said to me: "Even the French hate the Parisians"

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I Don't Think This Will End Well

        "I have never been insulted as a tourist in France"

        You obviously have not encountered the French "queueing" at Disneyland Paris....

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    That's one large patent portfolio, expect trolling.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "That's one large patent portfolio, expect trolling."

      Trolling is when you are not manufacturing things with the patents in question...

  6. x 7

    if they think they can rebrand the Alcatel phones and home networking gear as Nokia and actually sell them, then they are going to dilute the Nokia brand so much as to be worthless.

    This is just another nail in Nokia's coffin.

    1. JetSetJim

      Alcatel phones

      ALU don't make phones. The brand was flogged off to a Chinese corp long ago. An Alcatel phone is nowt to do with Alcatel-Lucent Technologies, Inc.

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