Nortel dumped as Olympics supplier

Organizers of the 2012 Olympics have stripped Nortel as official networking supplier and replaced it with Cisco.
 
Nortel was one of seven “tier-one” sponsors of the London Games in a deal reported to be worth Euro 47 million.
 
The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in January and has reached an agreement to sell its CDMA and LTE assets to Nokia Siemens.
 
London 2012 organizers LOCOG said on Friday Cisco had been appointed a “tier two” networking sponsor, starting immediately.
 
London 2012 CEO Paul Deighton said the Games’ “entire network infrastructure” had been impacted by Nortel’s decision to break itself up.
 
“We part with Nortel on good terms,” he said. “This is in no way a reflection of their capabilities – this is all about meeting our fixed deadlines.”
 
The London event has seven worldwide sponsors, including ICT firms Acer, Atos Origin, Panasonic and Samsung, seven tier-one suppliers, three tier-two and ten tier-three suppliers.