Near the end of the day Monday, the results of an auction between Lucent Technologies and Ericsson for the assets of Riverstone Networks were still unknown to a Riverstone spokesperson.

At mid-day Monday, the spokesperson said the auction for Riverstone’s assets could conceivably go on for days, though she called the idea unlikely.

Lucent and Ericsson were to take turns bidding for Riverstone’s assets in a bankruptcy court auction that was slated to begin at 10:00 am Eastern time today in New York.

The time allotted for each bid depended on how much the previous bid was raised, the Riverstone spokesperson said. The bigger the raise, the more time allowed for a response. “From what I understand, it’s like a chess game. There’s a shot clock,” she said.

Last Thursday Ericsson offered $178 million in cash for the assets of the carrier Ethernet equipment vendor, topping Lucent’s previous cash offer of $170 million.