Underlining how much fashion changes in the computer and telecommunications industry, back in 1982-83, the news that Northern Telecom Ltd had decided not to favour its 27% UK partner STC Plc with UK marketing of its Meridian 1 PABX would have caused a sensation, as would the fact that GEC Reliance, which built the Northern Telecom SL/1 predecessor under licence, would find its base under threat from British Telecommunications Plc with the new Meridian: today the PABX market is saturated, there are too many products chasing too few sites, GEC Plessey Telecommunications majors on Plessey’s ISDX but will come under pressure from new 40% shareholder Siemens AG to take on Siemens’ PABXs, no-one much wants British Telecom’s 51% of another PABX maker Mitel Corp, and it is unlikely that STC was particularly keen to take on the Meridian.
