...And XYLN would be better?
Cisco is certainly the world leader in pure IP technology. It also certainly is the world leader in overstating its advantage over all other companies. For marketing purposes it is entirely appropriate, god bless'em. But for advising investors, a little more digging please.
Ask the customers - not just the ones that have bought Cisco and love it, but the customers that have bought competitive gear and also love it. IP Navigator is not a technical joke. Customers with a pure IP network may prefer to implement IP over SONET or IP over DWDM, but incumbent carrier customers, with multi-service needs WILL implement IP over ATM. In this context, IP Navigator has been blowing Cisco and its MPLS/TAG implementation out of the water in technical bake offs. And has been implemented by carrier customers on 3 continents. And it will be implemented by big name carriers like AT&T and NTT. And it will be a factor in winning the lion's share of new carrier accounts in 1999, after being a factor in winning 60% of all new ATM contracts awarded in 1998.
By your CCIE router-centric standards, is there ANY company in the world, other than Cisco, with a drill down understanding of IP? Both ASND and LU have teams of engineers with deep, drill down understanding of IP. One of the great beauties of IP is that it is relatively simple, robust and has been with us in much the same form for 20 years. Of course it is a moving target with Cisco, quite appropriately, adding proprietary capabilities to its installed base all of the time. At least most ISPs have the good sense to stick to OSPF and BGP4.
I do believe that ASND has a deep understanding of IP as it is implemented in the internet, not including EIRGP and the rest of the IOS gobbletygook. Granted, GRF was a failure - largely because of the decision to go with GateD and a very buggy BGP4 implementation. Like the old ASND, they rushed the software to market. However, there are some very smart router engineers at ASND. You have to admire the hardware design of the GRF.
Finally, alot of the value selling into the IP market of the future will take place at the edge - voice over IP, VPN are applications programs that use IP. Here, I would argue ASND has proven itself a leader. When was the last time Cisco paid out the 3X commission bounty it has for sales reps that displace ASND remote access boxes. I can state with confidence that it has not happened at any of Ascend's 25 largest access accounts. The AS5300 and 5800 are dismal failures in my opinion. |
