To: Jim Lamb who wrote (38396 ) 7/17/2000 8:50:19 PM From: James Franks Respond to This announcement by Nortel sounds like Cisco's announcement of IOS (Internetwork Operating System), the software that runs all of Cisco's router product line. It can also be ported to other devices and Cisco will charge a licensing fee as I suspect Nortel will as well. Keep in mind that there are already cheap, standards based routers that you can buy now. No one serious about building competitive networks will ever use them since the software does not have all the great features that help you build a better network utilizing class of service, access list security, and all the hundreds of other featurs that Cisco includes today. A completely standard "open" product will only include features approved by the standards bodies and will only have the lowest common denominator set of features. You may have noticed if you watch this sort of thing that Cisco will come out with some great proprietary feature and the market will realize its value and its function gets proposed to the standards bodies. Many times it gets implemented very closely to how Cisco did it in the first place. However, if you wait several years for it to become a standard then your competitor, using Cisco's product, has passed you by. I don't think you will see a router become a commodity in the near future. It is too critical a piece of the network.
