Global Unified Communications vendor Avaya is contemplating splitting up their business to assist with paying of the company's debt.
Avaya is currently in talks with investment bank Goldman Sachs to help restructure their $6 billion debt liability. Potentially Avaya will sell all or part of their business.
If Avaya were to put themselves on the market, a sale price between $6 and $10 billion dollars is likely to be reached. Strategically it might be that they finally make the move away from traditional hardware sales to concentrate on software and cloud based solutions.
However at this time there is no official confirmation that they have plans to sell, Avaya's CEO Kevin Kennedy said in a trading update:
“Goldman Sachs is helping Avaya evaluate expressions of interest that have been received relative to specific assets, as well as explore other potential strategic opportunities.”
It's rumoured that key parts of the business which could be sold off could include Avaya’s wireless LAN and fabric switches divisions.
The recent launch of its platform-as-a-service (PaaS) subsidiary Zang has seemed to signal Avaya’s intent to focus attentions on the Cloud services market, moving away from network infrastructure.
Avaya's mounting debt burden is widely acknowledged as a major growth obstacle and if something isn't done soon Avaya might end up seriously compromising their future as a global leader in business communications.
