In the latest of its biweekly updates, Nortel said it still intends to file final results for the first half of fiscal 2004 by the end of the month and preliminary results for the third quarter as soon as possible afterward.
Otherwise, Nortel said it had nothing of material significance to report since its last update.
The announcement comes a week after the company at last filed restated results for 2001, 2002 and 2003, addressing billions in revenue that should not have been recorded on its books for 1999 and 2000.
Forensic accountants and lawyers continue to work with the audit committee to discover how and why the revenues in question were booked as they were in 1999 and 2000. At the same time, regulatory and criminal probes continue on both sides of the border in to the accounting scandal.
The Brampton, Ont.-based company has yet to say when it will file any figures for the fourth quarter of 2004.
CIENA FILES CLAIM
Separately, Maryland-based rival Ciena, which bought Ottawa's Catena Networks last year, has filed a patent complain in the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas.
Ciena accuses Nortel of infringing on six patents related to its communications networking systems and technology.
"Ciena has made significant investment in research and development in technology and the company's efforts and investment have resulted in innovation and advancements," Ciena said in a statement.
"Many of these advancements are the subject of patents issued to Ciena by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. In such cases where Ciena believes there is infringement on these patents by third parties, Ciena will seek to protect and enforce its intellectual property rights..."
Nortel had little comment to offer, since it has not yet received a copy of the complaint, according to spokeswoman Tina Warren.
Nor has Ciena yet decided on an amount of damages to claim, said Ciena spokeswoman Nicole Anderson, adding that Tuesday's filing was only an initial step in the process and any trial date is likely more than a year off.
ONI
Ciena's filing follows a case two years ago in which Ciena chose to settle patent charges brought by Nortel with a one-time payment of $25 million.
Nortel's bone of contention in that case related to patents it alleged had been infringed by ONI Systems Corp. Ciena later acquired ONI and Nortel continued its litigation by bringing an additional patent suit against Ciena.
The settlement, in January 2003, included an agreement between the two companies not to sue each other for patent infringement for two years and attempt to negotiate a cross-license agreement. Tuesday's filing by Ciena comes at the end of that two-year window.
Ciena's filing pertains to three patents for technology using in the asynchronous transfer mode standard. Two other patents refer to wavelength division multiplexing technology and one to synchronous optical network technology.
