LONDON -- Emergia (www.e-mergia.com), the Telefónica subsidiary that isbuilding Latin America's first broadband submarine cable network, hasselected Nortel Networks [NYSE/TSE: NT], a leading supplier ofhigh-capacity optical networking solutions, to bring a new,high-performance Internet to Latin America by building a regional opticalnetwork that will embrace the entire region from Florida to the SouthernCone of Latin America.

Nortel Networks will supply the terrestrial segments for Emergia'sbroadband network, which will link the entire continent by seamlesslyconnecting Latin America, the United States and the Caribbean. Emergia'snetwork will span more than 23,000 terrestrial and submarine kilometers,connecting Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, Guatemala, Puerto Rico and Florida. The first phase of the network is scheduled to beginoperation in the third quarter of this year.

http://www.nortel.com