Ciena Announces Voting Results of Annual Meeting of Shareholders.

LINTHICUM, Md. -- Ciena(R) Corporation (Nasdaq:CIEN), the network specialist, today announced voting results of its Annual Meeting held March 15, 2006 in Baltimore, Maryland.

Shareholders approved the following proposals in the proxy:

1.  Proposal to elect as Class III Directors Stephen P. Bradley,
    Ph.D and Gerald H. Taylor;

2.  Proposal to authorize the Board of Directors, in its discretion,
    to amend Ciena's Third Restated Certificate of Incorporation to
    effect a reverse split of its outstanding common stock at a ratio
    of (i) one-for-five, (ii) one-for-seven, or (iii) one-for ten,
    together with a corresponding reduction in the number of
    authorized shares of Ciena common stock and capital stock, at any
    time prior to the date of Ciena's 2007 Annual Meeting of
    Shareholders, without further approval or authorization of Ciena's
    shareholders; and,

3.  The ratification of the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP
    as Ciena's independent registered public accounting firm for the
    2006 fiscal year.

A shareholder proposal requesting that the Board of Directors adopt a majority vote standard for the election of directors was not approved by shareholders.

As of the record date of January 20, 2006, there were 581,261,502 shares eligible to vote. Proxies representing 495,950,700 shares, or 85.3 percent of the eligible voting shares were represented at the meeting. The results for each proposal were as follows:

1.  Proposal to elect Stephen P. Bradley, Ph.D. and Gerald H. Taylor:

----------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                      Percent of Total
                                                         Votes Cast
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Stephen P. Bradley, Ph.D. Votes For      471,012,287             95.0%
----------------------------------------------------------------------
                          Votes Withheld  24,938,413              5.0%
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Gerald H. Taylor          Votes For      470,866,586             94.9%
----------------------------------------------------------------------
                          Votes Withheld  25,084,114              5.1%
----------------------------------------------------------------------


2.  Proposal to authorize the Board of Directors to effect a reverse
    stock split as described above (approval required majority of
    total shares outstanding):

-----------------------------------------------
                               Percent of Total
                                    Shares
                                 Outstanding
-----------------------------------------------
Votes For         465,785,019             80.1%
-----------------------------------------------
Votes Against      26,608,196              4.6%
-----------------------------------------------
Votes Abstained     3,557,485              0.6%
-----------------------------------------------


3.  The ratification of the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP
    as Ciena's independent registered public accounting firm for the
    2006 fiscal year:

-----------------------------------------------
                               Percent of Total
                                  Votes Cast
-----------------------------------------------
Votes For         482,113,078             98.2%
-----------------------------------------------
Votes Against       8,934,503              1.8%
-----------------------------------------------
Votes Abstained     4,903,119        N/A
-----------------------------------------------


4.  Shareholder proposal requesting that the Board of Directors adopt
    a majority vote standard for the election of directors:

-----------------------------------------------
                               Percent of Total
                                  Votes Cast
-----------------------------------------------
Votes For          90,332,092             31.0%
-----------------------------------------------
Votes Against     200,700,973             69.0%
-----------------------------------------------
Votes Abstained    15,130,658        N/A
-----------------------------------------------
Shares Not Voted  189,786,977        N/A
-----------------------------------------------

About Ciena

Ciena Corporation is the network specialist, focused on expanding the possibilities for its customers' networks while reducing their cost of ownership. The company's systems, software and services target and cure specific network pain points so that telcos, cable operators, governments and enterprises can best exploit the new applications that are driving their businesses forward. For more information, visit www.ciena.com.