Toronto, Oct 2  Nortel, the 124-year-old Canadian telephone equipment company that is selling its various businesses to pay off its debtors, has announced to auction its GSM (global system for mobile communication) business also.

Like the previous auctions of the company's wireless business and enterprise unit, the GSM division will also be sold through "open auction", Toronto-based Nortel said in a statement here. Nortel makes equipment for GSM networks under this division.

Nortel said it will transfer specified patents used in the GSM business and grant "non-exclusive" licences of other relevant patents to the bid winner. GSM is the most popular wireless technology standard for mobile phones in the world today.

A leading supplier of equipment to GSM networks, Nortel has worked with operators around the world on implementing these access technologies. It has also provided equipment for GSM-R (GSM for Railways) which provides a secure communications system for railways around the world.

In fact, Nortel is currently the number supplier of equipment for GSM for railways (GSM-R) globally.

The auction will be held November 9 and subject to approval by the courts in the US and Canada since Nortel has operated under court-granted bankruptcy protection in the two countries since January this year.

Once the biggest telephone equipment makers in the world, Nortel sold its next-generation wireless business to Sweden's Ericsson under a court-supervised auction for $1.13 billion in July. In September, it sold its enterprise division to America's Avaya Inc. for $900 million.

At its height, Nortel employed more than 90,000 people worldwide and accounted for more than a third of the Toronto Stock Exchange. (IANS)