Canada's high-tech giant Nortel Networks Corp. November 2 announced an investment of 400 million US dollars to meet rising demand for telecom products for the Internet.

"We're moving at Web speed to meet the growing customer demand for our market-leading optical Internet capabilities," said Nortel President John Roth.

"It is also about enhancing a source of long-term competitive advantage," he added.

Nortel's spending priorities include the building of a new research center in Ottawa to produce precision lasers and other optical components.

Other projects involve the expansion of facilities and operations in Montreal, the second largest city of Canada, as well as in major cities of Britain, Northern Ireland and the United States.

The distribution of the investment is 143 million dollars in Ottawa, 82 million dollars in Montreal, 105 million dollars in Britain and 70 million dollars in the United States.

The total investment is expected to create 5,000 jobs, of which 2,300 will be in Canada, 1800 in Britain and 900 in the United States.

Nortel is the largest high-tech company in the country, with a work force of 70,000 around the world. It enjoys a leading position in the development of software and telecom hardware for the Internet.

The company's revenues were recorded at 17.6 billion dollars last year. (Xinhua)