Nortel spokesman David Chamberlin says the company will be closed by the end of the year. He notes that the company's 160 employees will be laid off. Chamberlin was unclear as to the size of Nortel's facility here and he notes that what will happen to the building at 299 Ballardvale St. has yet to be determined.

Chamberlin tells GlobeSt.com that CoreTek's product, tunable lasers for optical networks, is something the market is not ready for yet. "The product was more advanced than what is required," he says. This past spring Nortel laid off about 3,500 people or nearly 7% of its employees.

The telecommunications industry has been hit hard by the recent economic downturn as evidenced by the recent struggles of Lucent Technologies, Global Crossing and others.