Late yesterday, Plessey and GEC announced that protracted talks on merg- ing their System X public switching businesses had culminated in outline agreement to merge their entire telecommunications interests, public and private, into an equally-owned firm that would have annual sales of some UKP1,200m and assets of UKP600m. Although Plessey’s business is bigger, it is […]
Late yesterday, Plessey and GEC announced that protracted talks on merg- ing their System X public switching businesses had culminated in outline agreement to merge their entire telecommunications interests, public and private, into an equally-owned firm that would have annual sales of some UKP1,200m and assets of UKP600m. Although Plessey’s business is bigger, it is estimated that GEC would contribute 56% of profits. It appears that Plessey’s Stromberg-Carlson unit in the US would be included, as well as its ISDX PABX – causing a potential conflict with the Northern Telecom SL line sold by GEC Reliance. The outline agreement is subject to det-ailed negotiations, and is clearly timed for Telecom ’87 this month.