Exactly - Nortel had a big portfolio of phone switches (the DMS-10 and DMS-100 are the two that leap to mind) and I would assume a rich collection of switch pat

Exactly - Nortel had a big portfolio of phone switches (the DMS-10 and DMS-100 are the two that leap to mind) and I would assume a rich collection of switch patents as well. Too bad they blew up - can anyone recommend a good write-up about their implosion? I interned there and had a job offer that was rescinded around the time the dot com bust occurred. My recollection is that they heavily leveraged themselves to make a run at beating Cisco in the IP switch market. When everything melted down, they had nowhere to run.