Tellabs

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Tellabs
Type	Public (NASDAQ TLAB)
Founded	1975
Headquarters	Naperville, Illinois
Key people	CEO: Krish Prabhu Chairman: Mike Birck
Industry	Telecommunications Equipment
Products	fiber access, data network convergence, next-generation transport
Revenue	$462.5 million USD (2Q05)
Employees	4,000
Website	www.tellabs.com

Tellabs, Inc. NASDAQ: TLAB — a telecom start-up before that term was coined — came to life in 1975 to design, manufacture and sell telecom equipment for a number of niche telecom applications. A decade later, Tellabs seized opportunities created by the break-up of Ma Bell.

By the late 1980s, Tellabs introduced its version of digital-cross connect (DCS) technology to the RBOCs. The company would soon channel its blooming DCS efforts into its flagship Tellabs 5500 digital cross-connect (formerly known as TITAN 5500) in 1991. Responding to criticism during the extended initial development years of the 5500 that referred to the 5500 in derogatory slang as a “dog”, company founder Mike Birck predicted “This dog is gonna hunt!” as the 5500 was introduced to the marketplace. And hunt it did for Tellabs. The Tellabs 5500 is on one of the most impressive runs of any product in telecom. Almost 15 years later, the big-iron Tellabs 5500 system plays a key role in about 4,500 telecom central offices in North America. In fact, most of today’s U.S. voice and Internet traffic passes through a Tellabs 5500 system. In Europe, Latin America and Asia, Tellabs is known for the Tellabs 8100 managed access system (formerly known as MartisDXX), which delivers business services and provides transport for wireless networks.

In 2003, Tellabs acquired data start-up Vivace Networks. Tellabs has faced Goliath-like competitors as it plays its part as the David with multiservice routers for telecom networks. Telecom veteran Krish Prabhu took the CEO reigns from founder Mike Birck in 2004. After the closely watched acquisition of Advanced Fiber Communications (AFC) in November of 2004 and the acquisition of optical networking terminal start-up Vinci Systems in December 2004, Tellabs emerged as the leader in North America for fiber-based access to the home. Today, Tellabs offers a suite of solutions to telecom service providers, MSOs and wireless companies, that includes:

• Ethernet

• IP/MPLS

• Fiber access

• Video

• Mobile

• DSL

• Voice

• Services