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Avaya Canonizes Nick Kolintzas; Vatican "Is Ticked" | Print |  E-mail

Basking Ridge, NJ - In a brash departure from company policy, software giant Avaya confirmed Wednesday that it had granted Sainthood to Quagga's legendary Chief Technology Officer Nick Kolintzas.

saint nickAvaya board members voted unanimously for Kolintzas' canonization, citing "the great luminary's lifetime of miracles performed at the C-Level."

Company officials were unavailable for comment, though a press release was issued that referred to Kolintzas as "St. Nick" and credited the voice application "martyr" for Avaya's ascension to market leadership positions in IP Telephony, Contact Center and Unified Messaging.

The only other known canonization in the AT&T/Lucent/Avaya company continuum is Alexander Graham Bell who was beatified upon his death on August 2nd 1922, but never formally granted Sainthood.

While world financial markets reacted, a war of words erupted between Avaya and The Vatican over the controversial announcement.

"I don't know where to begin," Vatican spokesperson Giuseppe Benedetti wrote in an email to the New York Times. "For starters, this St. Nick person is alive. Saints have to be dead. Those are the rules."

Avaya's Canonization liaison, Mary McIreland, was incredulous in the face of the Vatican backlash. "With all due respect this is none of Catholicism's business. St. Nick is a corporate icon, not a religious one."

"I hate to brag but we invented Saints," Benedetti exhorted. "Avaya invented phones. You don't see me sitting here building a phone."

As word of the new Saint spread, accounts of visions and miracles were reported in all corners of the globe.

Most notably, on the Greek island of Naxos, people flocked to the home of Pyrros Saridakis to see for themselves the image of St. Nick on a falafel sandwich.

Nick K Seen In A Falafel


Remarkably, it was business as usual Wednesday for Kolintzas. "It's all very flattering," St. Nick commented from his Blackberry. "But I need to be in Irvine for a briefing in half an hour. Gotta run."

Ken Apperson reporting