3Com boss goes as Siemens deal ends

Networking Speculation of Cabletron buyout comes in wake of end of $100m partnership

The $100m joint venture between 3Com and Siemens to develop and market integrated voice and data products has been scrapped, amid rumours that Siemens is preparing to buy struggling networking vendor Cabletron.

Magnus Mellander, European marketing director at 3Com, said the companies will continue to co-operate on product development. "It's a matter of format, not content. We feel there are better ways to get the product out," he said.

Mellander insisted the Siemens/ 3Com product strategy given to resellers is still on track and 3Com will be able to bring products to market more quickly.

But one 3Com reseller said: "I saw it as an extremely positive move when 3Com teamed up with Siemens on voice. It's hard not to see this as a setback."

Steve Driskel, managing director of 3Com reseller Quatrix, said when the joint venture was announced he thought there was a more grandiose plan behind the scenes and suggested there may be more to this latest development than meets the eye.

Jean-Louis Seguineau, networking analyst at Metagroup, said Siemens has recently undergone extensive reorganisation, and its reliance upon 3Com for its IP strategy may be in doubt because 3Com is widely perceived as having fallen behind competitors in the past six months.

Seguineau said there were rumours circulating that Cabletron will announce its sale to a European telecoms company around 15 September. Siemens has been touted as the likely candidate.

He added the converged voice and data enterprise market is not growing as expected and both companies may have reconsidered the value of investing in it.

Mellander said 3Com's "multi-faceted" relationship with Siemens was still intact, although he hinted Siemens' technology may not be quite as central to 3Com's plans.

Eric Thickett, managing director of networking reseller MiTech, said 3Com has a lot of catching up to do in the voice market and may have decided the joint venture was not going to enable them to do so.

3COM MD TAKES UP ROLE AT FOUNDRY NETWORKS

Andy Palmer, UK managing director of 3Com, has resigned to become managing director of Foundry Networks in Europe. Arturo Cazares, vice president for Europe at 3Com, will assume responsibility for the UK until a replacement is found.

A source within the 3Com channel said three key account managers have also left and suggested the departures were a response to 3Com's inability to compete in the high-end corporate market.

But Palmer refuted the claim, saying: "The Corebuilder is a roaring success and causing Cisco real problems." Palmer was also quick to defend his former employer. "I genuinely regard 3Com as the number one networking company," he said.

Cazares would not comment on specific account managers, but said 3Com's enterprise sales were stronger than ever. "We are taking measures to strengthen our accounts team," he said.