MANILA, Philippines -- In astrategic move to optimize its existing Manila fiber optic tandemtrunking transmission network, Philippines Long Distance TelephoneCompany (PLDT) (NYSE:PHI) (PSE:TEL) plans to deploy ahigh-performance, DWDM (dense wavelength division multiplexing)metropolitan optical solution from Nortel Networks (NYSE:NT)(TSE:NT.). As part of this major upgrade, PLDT also plans to establish acentral tandem office in the municipality of Pasig for high-speedinterconnection to all metro switching centers, and add transmissioncapacity to local exchanges in Pasig, Garnet and Makati. "Growing use of the Internet and a significant rise inincreasingly sophisticated and bandwidth-hungry applications aredriving the decision to streamline our network," said George N. Lim,senior vice president, Network Development and Provisioning, PLDT."Nortel Networks OPTera Metro solution will cost-effectively enable usto remove Manila bottlenecks, increase connectivity speeds and, mostimportantly, drive dramatically improved service reliability for ourcustomers."Nortel Networks Corp.