Having fully expected to have completed the acquisition of Motorola's wireless infrastructure business by the end of last year, Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) is confident that it can complete the deal by the end of March.
The company has already been given the go-ahead to proceed with the purchase by regulators in the US, EU, Brazil, Japan, Russia, South Africa, Taiwan and Turkey, and is now only awaiting approval from the anti-monopoly regulator in China.
NSN's CEO, Rajeev Suri, said that the delay was disappointing, "but we're looking forward to completing the acquisition. We are continuing to work closely with the authority in China to finalise the clearance process in that country. We recognise its efforts in addressing this case as a matter of importance."
While conspiracy advocates will see China's foot-dragging as an attempt to disrupt the NSN/Motorola tie-up to better favour the marketing efforts of Huawei and ZTE, a more rational view is understanding the glacial pace adopted by the Chinese Ministry of Commerce in reviewing business transactions of this type.
Should the deal go ahead, then around 7,500 Motorola employees are expected to transfer over to NSN, with the largest number from the US, China and India.
For more:
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