Investopedia: Alcatel-Lucent Still In The Fight

Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) has had a long, difficult run. Created through the combination of two once well-respected, but struggling, telecom equipment vendors, Alcatel-Lucent has itself struggled to drive efficiencies from the merger. Making matters worse, the company has had to cope with a challenging capital equipment market while dealing with the rise of Chinese rivals Huawei and ZTE. 

Now, though, it looks as though the company may be making real progress towards becoming a more efficient operator and translating its good market share into better shareholder returns.

A Good Start to the Year
Alcatel-Lucent posted a pretty solid first quarter. While revenue did fall 23% on a sequential basis, revenue did grow about 15% on a year-on-year basis. Like Ericsson (Nasdaq:ERIC), Alcatel-Lucent saw a relative benefit from its wireless business, while the optics business was less impressive. IP performance depends on the context - a 31% sequential drop was pretty weak, but the 28% year-over-year growth was solid. 



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