3COM CTO John Hart Sees Converged Networks Changing the Economic
Structure of Education; In Keynote to Net '98, Hart States New
Technologies Increasing Access to Education
Business Wire - April 17, 1998 09:17
WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 17, 1998--"By the year 2000, network
convergence technology will make distance learning, telemedicine, digital libraries and Internet-based collaborative research more
accessible to more people and less expensive to operate and maintain,"
John Hart, 3Com senior vice president for technology and chief
technology officer, told a gathering of education technology directors
today in Washington. "This emerging technology will forever change the
economic landscape of higher education."
Most corporations and educational institutions today employ multiple
network infrastructures to support voice, video and data applications.
By converging these parallel networks, organizations will be able to
transform the educational process while simultaneously reducing
communications, operations and network management expenses.
"Converged network technology is quickly making education more
accessible and affordable for more students," Hart said during his
remarks to Net '98, an annual conference that explores major
developments in network policy, legislation, industry, and education.
"As a result, schools will be able to take highly sought after
curricula from prominent faculty and deliver this content to an
increasing number of students irrespective of geographical
boundaries."
3Com Corporation (NASDAQ:COMS), a leader in developing and implementing
next-generation networking technology for education environments, is a
corporate sponsor of Internet2, a partnership among federal research
agencies and leaders in the information technology industry to help
the nation's most prominent universities build next-generation
computer networks that support advanced education and research
applications.
"Network convergence requires both a dramatic reduction of the
complexity of network administration as well as a significant
increase in network reliability -- after all when was the last time
you had to reboot your telephone?" said Hart. "By moving from store
and forward traffic to real-time traffic, and from device management
to policy management, new multimedia applications will increase user
efficiencies as well as expand and change network access in completely
new and exciting ways."
The new generation of technologies used to build computer networks
today is far more sophisticated and better adapted to handle
multiple types of communications, including voice and video. In
addition to the core of the data network, intelligence has been added
to the access infrastructure and at the network access points to
handle multiple classes of service over a common TCP/IP-based
protocol infrastructure.
"For 15 years we have focused on building networks that support a
single best effort data-only networking service using multiple
infrastructure protocols like the Internet's IP family of protocols,
Novell's IPX, Apple's AppleTalk, and DEC's DECnet, but converged
networks support multiple data, voice, and video services using a
single IP protocol family," said Hart.
"This is a far bigger transition than going from the dominant networks
of the late 70's and 80's, like IBM's SNA (systems network
architecture) hierarchical terminal-to-host data transaction networks,
to today's world wide anywhere-to-anything Internet. And we are only
just beginning to realize the tremendous benefits this converged
networking transition will bring and the new applications it will
enable."
About 3Com
3Com Corporation enables individuals and organizations worldwide to communicate and share information and resources at anytime
from anywhere. As one of the world's preeminent suppliers of data, voice and video communications technology, 3Com has delivered
networking solutions to more than 100 million customers worldwide. The company provides large enterprises, small and medium
enterprises, carriers and network service providers, and consumers comprehensive, innovative information access products and
system solutions for building intelligent, reliable and high performance local and wide area networks. For further information, visit
3Com's World Wide Web site at 3com.com or the press site at http//www.3Com.com/pressbox.
Note to Editors: 3Com is a registered trademark of 3Com Corporation. All other company and product names may be trademarks of
the respective companies with which they are associated.
CONTACT: 3Com Corporate Communications
Peter Ruzicka, 408/764-5853
Peter_Ruzicka@3Com.com
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