Avaya Inc., an $8.3-billion-a-year subsidiary of Lucent Technologies, will open a corporate sales office in the Spokane Valley, a company spokeswoman says.


Mary Thiele, of Basking Ridge, N.J.-based Avaya (pronounced uh-VY-uh), says the company expects to open the office early next month. It will lease 6,000 to 7,000 square feet of floor space in the Pinecroft Business Park, at 12410 E. Mirabeau Parkway, and will employ 30 to 40 people there to start, she says.


These (people) have mostly been hired at this point since the office is scheduled to open in early August, Thiele says. Most of them were hired locally, she says. Thiele says she doesnt know the employees pay scale.


Avaya, which until earlier this summer was known as Lucents Enterprise Networks Group, provides voice, Internet, fax, and e-mail communications systems and software for businesses and government organizations.


Employees in its Spokane office will provide information to Avaya customers and take equipment orders, Thiele says.


Avaya posted sales of $8.3 billion and a profit of about $300 million last year. The company says that nearly 1 million enterprises in more than 90 countries have bought one or more of its systems, including more than three-fourths of Fortune 500 companies. Avaya will be spun off by Lucent into a separate company by the end of September, according to company literature.