Nortel's CEO Mike Zafirovski says there should be offers in place to sell off all of the company's business divisions within seven or eight weeks. By the end of this year, he expects all of Nortel to be sold.
In an interview with the Ottawa Citizen, Zafirovski said there's no decision yet on what to do with thousands of patents owned by Nortel.
There has been speculation Nortel could keep the patents and make a business out of licensing them. Zafirovski said if the patents are sold, they would be put up for auction.
Meanwhile, Zafirovski will take a pass on an emergency review of the Nortel sale by the federal industry committee. Nortel's chief strategy officer, George Riedel, will testify instead.
Nortel's CEO has previously said selling assets was the only option.
MPs on the committee will also hear from the CEOs of Ericsson and Research in Motion, as well as senior Industry Canada representatives.
Ericsson paid more than $1 billion for the wireless division. The committee wants to discuss the implications of the sale.
NDP MP Brian Masse, who is one of the committee members, told CTV Ottawa that taxpayers have funded a lot of Nortel's work.
"MPs should be able to ask questions about what benefit this will bring to Canada and are there national security issues," he said.
In addition, he said he wants to find out just how significant Nortel's technology is in the next generation of wireless. He also wants the committee to determine if we should be concerned that a foreign firm is getting access to that know-how.
It is expected that Ericsson's Canadian CEO Mark Henderson will talk about the decades of work Ericsson has done in Canada, emphasizing their huge 2,000-person operation in Montreal -- the company's largest research facility outside of Ericsson's home country of Sweden.
RIM's CEO Mike Lazaridis will also face his first direct questioning about complaints that his company was shut out of bidding, and as a Canadian firm should be given a crack at Nortel's assets.
Many have criticized RIM for not following the bidding process for the wireless division.
Speaking of bidding, the courts have now approved the timeline for the sale of the next business unit of Nortel: the enterprise business.
Bids must be submitted by Sept. 4. An auction among bidders will take place on Sept. 11, with court approvals on Sept. 15.
So far, one bidder - Avaya - has put down a $475-million offer. Two other groups have protested the bidding process and have yet to make a decision on whether they will bid.
