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Only two weeks ago Nortel was reported to be poised to get out of wireless networking, but the Canadian firm does not throw in the towel easily, and managed to make a splash at last week's WiMAX World show even though it no longer plans to make its own WiMAX products.

The company has always preached the importance of building a broad ecosystem around WiMAX at an early stage, in order to differentiate it from other networks through a well differentiated choice of devices and applications. Now it is stretching the ecosystem concept so far as to rely on a third party - Alvarion - even for the RAN infrastructure itself, but still insists it can play a pivotal role as integrator and as the hub for an innovative line-up of partners.

The Nortel WiMAX ecosystem was expanded last week to include such diverse partners as IBM, core networking specialist WiChorus, Quanta Computer and Accton Wireless Broadband.

Between them, and with the addition of a group of device makers, Nortel says it will offer an end-to-end platform, and that this best of breed approach - with the key supplier not actually providing the hardware - represents a blueprint for next generation networks, that many will emulate.

One of the most strategic areas of Nortel's portfolio is unified communications, and particularly its alliances with IBM and Microsoft. Now it is extending its UC strategy to new networks, including WiMAX, and is working with IBM to deliver Lotus Notes capabilities over 802.16e. This will support a range of services including IP telephony, instant messaging, web conferencing, video chat and unified messaging, regardless of location and device.

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