Nortel Buzzboard

Last week at Global Connect, one message I heard over and over was around the growth of INNUA — the International Nortel Networks Users Association. At the opening keynote session, INNUA President Steve Ford said thatmore than 500 new companies had joined INNUA in the last couple of months, and that membership had increased more than 5% YTD with several chapters having doubled in size.

Joel Hackney, Nortel’s president of enterprise solutions, spoke right after Steve Ford and added that end user attendance for Global Connect was up 41% versus last year (at a time when travel is being restricted).

So is all this growth with Nortel’s enterprise users’ group a pre-indicator of a coming Nortel enterprise growth spurt? Granted, Nortel’s enterprise division has been flashing positive signals for a while now. But do the eye-popping INNUA numbers suggest even more is to come?

The question is: is it just “better marketing” or is it a sign of real progress?

I think the answer is maybe a little of both. There is real progress in enterprise, as recent numbers have shown. And more than one person I talked to at the show said the “vibe” was better than in year’s past. Since Joel Hackney has taken over enterprise, he and the enterprise marketing team have made customer relationships a priority — and that’s a big part of what INNUA is about. So my impression is that the support of INNUA by Nortel is up…which could be seen as “marketing.” Of course, INNUA is Nortel’s customer base — so doesn’t that by default imply better support of Nortel enterprise customers?

While at the show, I had a great conversation with Maria McCallion, a member of INNUA’s Board of Directors. Her impression was also that there was a great vibe at the show, and she was very bullish on INNUA’s future. I was able to get her to sit down and talk about INNUA, how it has changed and where it is going. See that video below: