Lucent is losing its grip on the telecoms infrastructure market as the company's bankers begin to turn the screw.

Results published by analyst Gartner show that Ericsson outsold Lucent, as the networking giant slipped from top spot to fourth place. The Swedish mobile specialist's manufacturing division pulled clear of Lucent by $5.5bn of revenue.

The results were published in the same week as it was reported that the company's bankers had secured promises that losses in the first half of 2001 would reach a maximum $2.35bn, and that its strategy would produce minimum profits of $1bn by the spring of 2002.

Mark Blowers, senior researcher at the Butler Group, said that Ericsson could keep Lucent at bay if it took advantage of its strengths.

"Ericsson has taken an early market lead in third-generation (3G) networks. Of all the companies involved in 3G networks, it is the most likely to get a significant return."

Lucent pointed out that, had the figures included revenues from Avaya, the enterprise networking division that the company spun off last year, its results would have placed it above the Swedes.