Today Nortel Networks Corp.a Canada based multinational telecommunications equipment manufacturer has filed for bankruptcy protection. It is North America’s biggest maker of telephone equipments. So we have one more victim of the economic recession. Nortel has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S., Toronto and Europe. Nortel, based in Toronto, had more than $1 billion in assets and debt, according to a Chapter 11 filing of its U.S. subsidiary today in Wilmington, Delaware. 14 affiliates of Nortel’s financing unit are seeking similar protection in Delaware. Five units filed for bankruptcy there under Chapter 15.

According to the experts the reason of bankruptcy is the recent decline in its sales, especially in North America. In December 2008, Nortel was notified by the New York Stock Exchange the company would be delisted if common stock shares fail to rise above $1 per share within 6 months. The company’s stock price a few years back was $860 and now it is only 21 cents. Nortel owes creditors about $3.8 billion, but efforts to sell assets to meet current obligations faltered after the global financial crisis got strucked in October, last year.

“It’s the end of a saga, Nortel is a corpse awaiting burial. I’m sad to see it happen but the tears were shed many months ago.” said Benoit Lalonde, vice president of fixed income at Laurentian Bank Securities, a unit of Canada’s seventh-largest bank.