This notion was sparked by comments made by Volker Jung, telecommunications board member, who had implied that Siemens was in the process of looking for a partner to manufacture handsets. Mr von Pierer made clear this week that this was not the case.
It seems the two men are in desperate need of communication themselves, as the CEO needed to make further corrections on what Jung had said about the enterprise networking activities of ICN telephony unit. Its relocation into the IT services business, Mr von Pierer said, would not take place any time soon. The volatile telecommunications market has resulted in heavy losses for ICN, but the company will be granting the business another year to meet its operating targets.
With 3G services still largely on hold in Europe, Toshiba has also pulled out of its joint venture with Siemens, blaming the expense of 3G licences as well as the lack of demand for information technology products worldwide.
