Alcatel-Lucent, one of the world's top ranked telecommunications equipment manufacturer and distributor, posted its third quarter report on Friday which revealed disappointing figures, bigger losses and falling sales. Despite the loss, the company is aiming at reaching its target for the current fiscal year.

"Against what remains a challenging market environment, we reiterate our view that our addressable market should be down between 8% and 12% at constant currency and that we will achieve an adjusted operating income around break-even this year", said Chief Executive Ben Verwaayen.

The Paris based telecom equipment giant posted a net loss of a whopping 182 Million Euros for the third quarter or period between July-September for the current year. This was much bigger than the loss reported for the same period last year which stood at 40 Million Euros. The figures posted have been much below the estimate made by analysts polled by Dow Jones, which pegged the company's profit at 8 Million Euros.

Alcatel's revenue also fell by 9.3% and now stood at 3.69 Billion Euros as compared to last year's revenue of 4.07 Billion. Analysts had estimated the revenue to be nearly 3.91 Billion Euros.

A weak economy, dipping sales and tough competition from foreign vendors is being blamed by the company for its ever rising losses. Nonetheless, the firm is now looking to improve its conditions in the coming year.