Beleaguered IT shares led a rally in European equity markets as investors, for once, decided to put the bad news for the sector behind them.

The FTSE Eurotop 300 Information Technology index registered a gain of more than 6 per cent in afternoon trade. Telecommunications equipment shares, badly dented in recent sessions by bleak results from sector peers Nortel Networks and Lucent Technologies and a run of indifferent trading statements in Europe, were at the front of the upturn.

Alcatel, which ran into a wide swathe of negative broker comment following this week's results, jumped 6.8 per cent to #18.90. Mobile handset leaders Nokia and Ericsson gained 6.4 per cent to #24.01 and 8.7 per cent to SKr51.50 respectively. Elsewhere in the technology sector, management and IT consultancy Cap Gemini Ernst & Young jumped 5.7 per cent to #76.45 ahead of results on Monday.

Chipmaker STMicroelectronics jumped 6.5 per cent to #35.35 on news that UDS semiconductor orders rose 3.2 per cent in the June durable goods index.

Among the German tech groups, Siemens rose 2.6 per cent to #61.52 while SAP was 2.2 per cent higher at #160.30. Epcos gained 2.9 per cent to #49.90 in spite of reduced price target of 40 from UBS after Thursday's news of a sharp fall in third-quarter earnings.

However, cable concerns sprang from news of devastating losses at JDS Uniphase, Canada's fibre-optics leader.