[November 12, 2004]

Aastra to Buy EADS� Enterprise Telephony Business

BY JOHANNE TORRES

Aastra (news - alert) Technologies has begun negotiations to buy EADS (news - alert) Telecom’s Enterprise Telephony Business. The deal would aid EADS’ strategic focus to further develop its European large system integrator business in Defense. The company has decided to find a capable successor for its Enterprise Telephony Business, with a strong customer focus and operating experience in the Private Branch eXchange (PBX) and VoIP markets.

Once the consultation period with the official employee representative bodies of EADS has been completed, EADS and Aastra intend to enter into an agreement whereby Aastra will purchase the EADS Enterprise Telephony Business. This business generated approximately €170 million (approx 220.5 million US dollars) revenues in its last complete fiscal year that ended in December 2003. The net cash consideration at closing could be approximately €72.5 million (approx 94 million US dollars).

“We are confident that Aastra is the ideal telecom focused partner to ensure the long-term development of EADS Telephony over IP, which would certainly reinforce the outstanding technology and quality of service delivered to all our customers,” said Michel Fouques, CEO of EADS Telecom.

Aastra began expanding efforts with the purchase of the PBX division of ASCOM Holdings AG. last year. “In addition to enhancing our current focus on the small-to-medium enterprise (SME) segment of the PBX / Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) market, we would be able to expand our product offerings to include proven technological platforms for larger enterprise and call center applications” said Francis Shen, Chairman and CEO of Aastra.

EADS
http://www.eads-telecom.com

Aastra Technologies Limited
http://www.aastra.com