Nortel-RIM could be PM's Avro Arrow; Subsidizing sale of patents to foreigners would earn Harper ignominy to rival Diefenbaker's jet legacy
The Toronto Star
Thu Jul 23 2009
Page: B01
Section: Business
In recent years, Canada has lost so many national industrial
champions - Alcan, Inco, Abitibi, Falconbridge, Seagram - it should
seem a no- brainer that if a Canadian firm wants to salvage
something from the ashes of one of the few remaining champions, a
bankrupt Nortel Networks Corp., that effort should enjoy widespread support.
But no. The public, media and government are indifferent to this
week's dramatic bid by Research In Motion's co-CEO Jim Balsillie to
buy up key Canadian technology from Nortel for $1.1 billion
(U.S.).
Ottawa and Queen's Park hastened to pony up $10 billion (Canadian)
to rescue foreign-owned General Motors Corp. and Chrysler Corp. ButOttawa's role at Nortel has been, through its Export Development Corp., to extend $300 million in financing to a Finnish-German joint venture that seeks to buy Nortel's top asset, its wireless technology.
Waterloo-based RIM, maker of the BlackBerry, one of Canada's few
globally renowned exports, accuses Nortel, still run by an imported U.S. turnaround expert who was a dismal failure at turning the firm around, of blocking it from bidding on Nortel's crown jewel, the wireless division for which RIM archrival Nokia Siemens Networks BV has the inside track.
2 comments:
That would mean Harper actually has two "Avro Arrows" so far...Nortel and AECL.
We are going backward at a time when Canada's technological expertise should be the vanguard.
As I predicted, there is now no doubt Harper is intent upon taking us back to the dark ages. It's just that the pace is picking up now.
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