CEO Robert Mao has been running 3Com
Mao (no relation to the former Chinese leader) noted that his company owns about as much market share in data networking equipment as Cisco Systems
This new deal is off to a somewhat inauspicious start, though. 3Com reported a fourth-quarter net loss of $167 million, or $0.41 per share, on $321 million in revenue. That includes a writedown of goodwill of about $158 million related to the 2005 acquisition of security expert TippingPoint, in a review that was triggered by recent share price movements. Without that charge and certain other inconvenient cost items, 3Com actually saw a $0.09 profit per share, nine times the $0.01 per share reported a year ago.
So the question now is whether Mao can build a decent market share in other developing regions like Eastern Europe and Latin America, and steal some sales in North America from regionally strong competitors like Nortel Networks
Mao comes to this job from two years at the helm of 3Com's Chinese operations and about 11 years of similar posts for Nortel and Alcatel
Further Foolishness: