CIENA Appoints Chaddick Senior VP, Systems and Technology; Champa Assumes Strategic Corporate Development Role.

Business Editors

LINTHICUM, Md.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 17, 2000

CIENA Corporation (Nasdaq: CIEN), today announced that Steve Chaddick, a founding member of CIENA's management team and currently CIENA's President, Core Switching Division, has been appointed Senior Vice President, Systems and Technology for CIENA. In this new role, Chaddick will lead the product development efforts across CIENA's Core Switching, Transport Systems and Access Systems divisions.

In addition, the Company announced that Michael Champa, former CEO of Omnia Networks and currently President of CIENA's Access Systems Division, will become the CIENA's Senior Vice President, Corporate Development.

"When we brought CIENA, Lightera and Omnia together last year, it was critical to allow our new Core Switching and Access Systems Divisions to continue their respective product development paths uninterrupted in separate and very focused divisions," said Patrick Nettles, CIENA's President and Chief Executive Officer. "In less than a year, both groups have made great progress and the initial products are rapidly approaching commercial availability."

"In the time since initially uniting these three companies, it's become clear that there are many potential cross-synergies between the different development efforts that we can better leverage," continued Nettles. "Under Steve's leadership, we believe we will be able to identify and facilitate those synergies."

"I'm pleased that Mike Champa has agreed to take on the Corporate Development role for CIENA," Nettles stated. "During the last several months, CIENA's focused very keenly on executing current product efforts. It's necessary, however, that we continue to explore strategic opportunities to further expand our customer base and our growing product portfolio. Mike's industry savvy and market expertise are ideally suited for this strategic role."

Chaddick joined CIENA in 1994 as Vice President, Product Development. He served as Senior Vice President, Products and Technologies from September 1996 through September 1998 when he assumed the role of Senior Vice President, Strategy and Corporate Development. Since July 1999, he has been acting President of CIENA's Core Switching Division. Prior to joining CIENA, Chaddick was Vice President of Engineering at AT&T Tridom, a company he co-founded in 1983 and which was acquired by AT&T in 1988. Chaddick received both his B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Champa joined CIENA in July 1999 with CIENA's acquisition of Omnia Networks, a company co-founded by Mr. Champa in 1997. Champa was President and CEO of Omnia from June 1997 until joining CIENA. From April 1992 to May 1997, Champa served as Vice President, Worldwide Sales and Service at Cascade Communications Corp. Champa has a B.A. degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, as well as M.B.A. and M.P.A. degrees from Suffolk University.

The Company also announced that Charles Chi, Vice President of Marketing, would resign as of the end of January 2000 to pursue other interests. Until a suitable candidate is recruited to fill this role, CIENA's marketing activities will report directly to CEO and President, Patrick Nettles.

ABOUT CIENA

CIENA Corporation's market-leading optical networking systems form the core for the new era of telecommunications networks worldwide. CIENA's LightWorks(TM) architecture changes the fundamental economics of service-provider networks by simplifying the network and reducing the cost to operate it. Additional information about CIENA can be found at http://www.ciena.com.

NOTE TO INVESTORS

Forward-looking statements in this release, including that the initial products of CIENA's ASD and CSD are rapidly approaching commercial availability, are based on information available to the Company as of the date hereof. The Company's actual results could differ materially from those stated or implied by such forward-looking statements, due to risks and uncertainties associated with the Company's business. The forward-looking statements should be considered in the context of these and other risk factors disclosed in the Company's report on Form 10-K, as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on December 10, 1999.