Fujitsu Network Communications is the likely winner of a Verizon Communications contract for reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexers (ROADMs), according to a research note issued this morning by UBS, which estimated the contract to be worth $50 million per year.

A Verizon spokesman said only that no decision has been made on the ROADM request for proposals (RFP), and a Fujitsu spokesman said the company does not comment on ongoing RFPs. UBS based its assertion on “discussions with industry contacts,” the note said.

Verizon said earlier this year that it expected to pick a ROADM vendor in the second half of this year and deploy the gear in 2006.

Fujitsu unveiled its ROADM, version 4.1 of its Flashwave 7500, in April 2005, a few weeks after research analysis firm RHK declared Fujitsu the leader of the 2004 metro ROADM market, having taken more than 80% of the North American market (stemming largely from sales to the cable industry) and 75% of the worldwide market, bolstered by big sales in Japan.

Verizon told Telephony that month that it was interested in a ROADM that could also provide wavelength-selective switching capabilities in its superhubs and that Fujitsu was positioning its 7500 as just such a product.

Last year, some analysts predicted Movaz Networks and Lucent Technologies--working as partners and leveraging Lucent’s strong ties to Verizon--would be a front-runner for the Verizon ROADM RFP. “That's why Lucent is in this business,” RHK analyst Ron Kline told Telephony a year ago. “Because it's their customer, Verizon, whom they stand to lose.”