STLC will provide RAID drives and possibly servers in addition to their 2.5MM financing. Add Bay Networks to the list of participants in the Concentric / STLC / Sattel etc project. They've standardized on HP's OpenView systems architecture too. Still accumulating STLC and view the present as good buying opportunity but would like to see the price a little lower to get average cost below $2 per share !
(Keep Selling !)
CONCENTRIC NETWORK BUILDS INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER NETWORK WITH BAY NETWORKS' INTERNETWORKING SOLUTIONS
Companies Team To Provide Infrastructure for North American Internet and Intranet Services, Collaborate on Next-Generation ATM-Based Backbone Network
CUPERTINO, CALIF. - Concentric Network Corporation, a leading North American provider of online network access services, today announced it has selected Bay Networks, Inc. (NYSE: BAY), a leading North American provider of on-line network access services, to deploy Bay Networks' high-performance networking equipment in Concentric's Internet backbone infrastructure to support both local Internet access and virtual private intranets.
As part of this alliance, Concentric and Bay Networks are piloting the ATM backbone development for a new on-line access network architecture that will deliver high performance and low latency to support emerging on-line applications. Using approximately $3 million of Bay Networks' products, including backbone and remote access routers, intelligent hubs, remote access servers and network management solutions, the Concentric network is a leading gateway to the Internet and accommodates traditional business and consumer users, as well as multi-player network gaming and multi-party simultaneous voice/data transmission.
After a careful evaluation of various suppliers, Concentric chose a solution based on equipment and network integration services from Bay Networks and Racal Datacom, which is a value-added reseller of Bay Networks equipment.
"This partnership offers a competitive advantage to both organizations," said Henry R. Nothhaft, President and CEO at Concentric Network. "Concentric is focused on delivering high-speed, dial-up Internet access and customized intranet solutions to our customers. The integration of Bay Networks' highly tailored networking solutions in our communications network gives us the flexibility and scalability needed to quickly respond to our customers' connectivity requirements, while adapting to new market trends with highly customized services."
"As today's business and networking demands change, organizations are increasingly requiring advanced networking solutions for network transport, carrier service and customization," said Brian Walck, Director of Internet Business at Bay Networks. "Concentric satisfies these requirements with a range of low-cost, high-speed Internet connectivity options as well as virtual private network, or intranet, services designed to meet the individual and changing data communications needs of various customers. Bay Networks is pleased to be partnering with Concentric to provide a full suite of backbone, remote access and network management solutions that enable the broadest range of connectivity requirements and customized offerings."
Concentric Network Delivers High-Speed Internet/Intranet Services
Delivering high throughput and reliability, the Concentric network contains over 200 Point of Presence (POP) nodes in the United States and Canada, supporting Internet and intranet connectivity for users throughout North America. Local access calls are received at each POP and are then aggregated using Xylogics' Remote Annex remote access servers from Bay Networks. The servers then feed the calls onto a Bay Networks Access Node (AN) router for transmission to the backbone network. The Remote Annex servers also ensure user authentication using the Xylogics Access Control Protocol (ACP). This highly scaleable, Unix-host-based protocol enables Concentric to customize authentication for remote users throughout its extended network.
Concentric's wide area backbone network, which relies on OSPF as its core routing protocol, is focused around the company's data centers in Bay City, Michigan and Cupertino, California, and its network operations center in St. Louis, Missouri. The data and network operations centers use Backbone Concentrator Node (BCN) routers from Bay Networks to consolidate data traffic from the POPs. The BCNs also provide access to the Internet and other content locations within the Concentric intranetwork. System 5000 intelligent hubs from Bay Networks are used in the data center to consolidate both Ethernet and FDDI LAN traffic, while Bay Networks' LattisSwitch Model 28115 Fast Ethernet Switching Hubs deliver 10/100 Ethernet switching capabilities.
Additionally, Concentric has standardized on Bay Networks' Optivity network management application suite to manage its distributed environment. Because Optivity is closely integrated with Hewlett-Packard's OpenView, Concentric benefits from a top-down approach to viewing the entire computing and communications system on the network.
Next-Generation ATM Backbone Network
With the emergence of new networking demands and applications -- such as virtual private networks and intranets, interactive multi-player gaming, digitized voice, compressed video, and on-line transaction processing -- Concentric is redesigning its network architecture. This new network design will improve overall performance and minimize network operating costs by decreasing latency, increasing throughput and adding functionality. The existing Concentric Network provides on-line access via plain old telephone systems (POTS), 800 access and customized dedicated access facilities across a frame relay backbone.
Through partnerships with various local carriers, Concentric will increase network access by leveraging the carrier's network, which serves 60 cities throughout North America and connects more buildings than any other service provider. Additionally, the next-generation backbone network will be expanded to include ATM, T3 and SONET capabilities.
Concentric is deploying Bay Networks' high-end BCN routers with ATM Routing Engine (ARE) interfaces in its next-generation network to meet the requirements of high performance and throughput for transaction processing, and low, fixed latency for emerging technologies within an ATM-based virtual network environment. Specifically engineered for highly scaleable virtual network routing environments, the ARE interface in the BCN routers provides 155 Mbps full duplex routing between multiple virtual LANs on a single ATM interface.
The BCN routers also maximize performance via a symmetric multi-processor architecture that enables Concentric to build a scaleable, fault-resilient network. Tony Zeis, Concentric's Director of Network Architecture, commented, "The symmetric multi-processor architecture of Bay Networks' Backbone Concentrator Node platform is unique to the industry. It provides an unmatched level of fault-resiliency and interfaces, such as FDDI, T3 and ATM, in a single router chassis without any degradation in throughput."
Based on its multiprotocol capabilities, the BCN router satisfies the high performance and availability requirements of the most demanding mission-critical backbone internetworks. It supports 104 LAN/WAN interfaces (up to 13 FDDI) and system forward performance that scales to 1 million packets per second. Comprehensive hardware and software redundancy options ensure fault resiliency.
About Bay Networks
Bay Networks, Inc. is a worldwide leader in the internetworking market, providing a full line of products that serve enterprises, small offices and mobile workers. The company offers market-leading LAN and ATM switches, hubs, routers, remote and Internet access solutions, and network management applications, all unified by the BaySISO architecture. With revenue of $1.9 billion over the past four fiscal quarters, Bay Networks markets and supports its products from 121 offices around the world, providing 7x24 support coverage. Bay Networks' World Wide Web address is: baynetworks.com.
About Concentric
Concentric Network Corp., based in Cupertino, Calif., is a leading provider of communications solutions designed to connect people to information, entertainment and other people. Founded in 1991, the company is privately held. Using high-performance frame relay technology delivering on-line access at speeds of up to 28.8 kilobits per second, the nationwide Concentric Network offers fast, high-quality, individual dial-up service to consumers and network access on a custom basis to businesses across the country. Concentric Network's web address is concentric.net.
CONTACTS:
CONCENTRIC NETWORK CORPORATION
KRISTINE LOOSLEY
(408) 342-2808
KRIS@CONCENTRIC.NET
concentric.net
BAY NETWORKS INC.
CHRIS CARLETON (508) 436-3706
CCARLETO@BAYNETWORKS.COM |
