Cisco prepares to launch high-end networking blitz
[I'm interested in comments. Gary, Bucky89?]
By Paula Musich, PC Week Online
05.21.98 7:00 pm ET
zdnet.com
Cisco Systems Inc. early next month will
introduce a trio of new high-end wide area
ATM switch/routers and remote access
concentrators at the ATM Year 98
conference in San Jose.
Rather than provoke fear and loathing in Las Vegas at NetWorld +
Interop earlier this month among the likes of Ascend Communications
Inc., Lucent Technologies Inc. and Fore Systems Inc., Cisco (CSCO)
will use the ATM Forum's showcase in San Jose, Calif., to debut its
new 20G-bps carrier-class ATM switch, a high-density wide area edge
switch and a follow-on to the Cisco 12000 Gigabit Switch Router,
according to sources.
The ATM switch, code-named Wildcat, is intended for carriers and
ISPs that require full redundancy and NEBS compliance. The switch,
based on ATM chip sets from MMC Networks Inc., uses two
switching modules at its core and adds a third module for redundancy. It
also adds new 2.5G-bps ATM OC-48 and OC- 48 packet over Sonet
interfaces, according to sources close to the Cisco.
Wildcat will also add another Cisco platform capable of supporting tag
switching-or MPLS (Multiprotocol Label Switching), in Internet
Engineering Task Force parlance. To date, tag switching is being
implemented in the Stratacom BPX and in the 12000 Gigabit Switch
Router.
Wildcat is due out in the first quarter of next year. "Traditional carriers are showing a lot of interest in MPLS because they are doing cell switching in the core of their networks," said Dave Passmore, president of NetReference Inc., a Sterling, Va., consulting firm.
The WAN edge switch, code-named Pop Eye, can support as many as 960 digital modems and 1,000 channelized T1 links. The high-port-density box will also include an OC-3 uplink. It is due in the third quarter of this year, sources said.
The Gigabit Switch Router 12000 follow-on, code-named Jupiter, is Cisco's answer to next-generation router startups such as Avici Systems Inc., NEO Networks Inc. and NetCore Systems Inc., which are promising up to terabit speeds for IP routing.
Jupiter will provide a combination of packet and cell switching and can scale up to 250G bps of switching capacity. It is not due until the second half of next year, sources said.
Cisco officials in San Jose had no comment.
The company can be reached at www.cisco.com.
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