Company retains initiative between ALU/Bell Labs and the University of Pittsburg Medical Center.

Alcatel-Lucent, a US-based telecom equipments maker, is understood to have shut its corporate venturing unit.

Alcatel-Lucent Ventures had focused on internal incubation of ideas within the company’s Bell Labs after spinning off its external equity investments to venture capital firm New Venture Partners in 2002.

A source inside Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) said the Ventures unit had been closed earlier this year and Bart Shigemura, vice-president of Alcatel-Lucent Ventures, had left. A source source inside the company confirmed: "The internal ventures (those…