Nortel channels Guns & Roses: Just a little patience

The executives of Nortel have been walkin’ the streets at night

Just trying to get this bankruptcy right.

It’s hard to see the future with Cisco and Avaya around

You know they don’t like being stuck in that crowd

Customers think this waiting is lame.

They just don’t have time for this game.

But Nortel needs another month or two

To restructure.

Yeah, restructure.

Just a little more tiiiiime. Yeah.

Indeed, Nortel is asking the courts - and its wary customers - for just a little more patience.

Last month at VoiceCon, dozens of Nortel customers gathered at a special session entitled “I’m a Nortel customers. What do I do now?” At the session, customers peppered Nortel Enterprise president Joel Hackney with pointed questions about the future of the company. Hackney was candid in many of his responses, but quite often he deferred his answers. He assured customers that in May customers would get more answers, for May was the month that Nortel would file its restructuring plans in Canadian and U.S. courts.

Now we learn that Nortel and its court-appointed bankruptcy monitor, Ernst & Young, are asking the courts for an extension to July 30. Nortel customers will just have to find a little more patience for the ailing vendor, or they may want to do what many Nortel customers did at VoiceCon this year: Get to know the other players on the market.