Ciena Names Sales SVP

LINTHICUM, Md. -- Ciena(R) Corporation (Nasdaq:CIEN), the network specialist, today announced that Mike Aquino, previously Ciena's Vice President, Americas, assumes the role of Senior Vice President, Worldwide Sales reporting to Ciena President and CEO Gary Smith.

"In the last several years, Ciena's traversed some very challenging ground from a sales perspective," said Smith. "With eight sequential quarters of revenue growth, we have significantly expanded our customer base to include cable providers, government customers and enterprises in addition to our traditional telco service provider customers, and we're increasingly expanding our channel and partner relationships globally."

"During his tenure with Ciena, Mike has played an active role in the Company's sales growth and clearly demonstrated he has the skills and experience required to manage the multi-faceted role of Ciena's worldwide sales leadership, as well as the desire and drive to fuel Ciena's forward progress and momentum," continued Smith.

Aquino, 49, takes over for Jim Collier, who has left Ciena to pursue other opportunities. Said Smith, "We are grateful to Jim for his contributions of the last several years during what was unquestionably a difficult period for the industry and we wish him well in his next endeavor."

With more than 25 years of experience in the information technology and telecommunications industry, Mr. Aquino came to Ciena in June 2002 through its acquisition of ONI Systems, where he served as Vice President, Eastern Americas Sales. His prior roles at Ciena include Vice President, Worldwide Enterprise and Channels, and Vice President, Ciena Government Solutions, Inc. (CGSI). In both roles, Aquino successfully established new market opportunities for Ciena, while expanding Ciena's existing relationships with its existing telecommunications carrier customers.

Aquino's prior experience includes roles as Vice President of Global Accounts and Solutions Integrators at Nortel Networks, where he was charged with driving sales of data, telephony, and optical technologies to Nortel's largest global enterprise customers. Mr. Aquino also held enterprise, carrier, government, and business partner sales management positions at Bay Networks as Vice President of Business Partner Sales and Vice President of the U.S. Southern Region and Caribbean. In the latter role, he was also responsible for Bay Networks' U.S. Federal Government business. Previously, Mr. Aquino served 11 years at IBM Corporation, where he held several sales management positions in support of the media, telecommunications, and power utility industry in the U.S.

Mr. Aquino holds a B.A. in psychology from Cathedral College in Queens, New York.

Ciena Corp. (NYSE: CIEN)