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Technology Stocks : Ascend Communications (ASND) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: djane who wrote (47672)	5/28/1998 2:40:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 61433

Lucent takes direct aim at Cisco, Ascend with giant IP switch nwfusion.com By David Rohde Network World Fusion, 5/28/98 Lucent Technologies, Inc. yesterday proved as good as its word - it's going to compete tooth and nail with top data vendors to provide giant IP switching capacity. The telecom equipment giant unveiled the PacketStar IP Switch, a carrier-class Layer 3/Layer 4 routing switch that potentially provides thousands of different levels of service quality for IP applications. The PacketStar switch delivers up to 32 million packet/sec with 128G bit/sec of total backplane capacity. It initially will be sold to carriers and ISPs that are also being targeted by Cisco Systems, Inc. with its 12000 Gigabit Switch Router, unveiled about a year ago. Bill O'Shea, president of Lucent's Data Networking Division, said that new Bell Laboratories-developed algorithms enable the PacketStar switch to support up to 64,000 separate traffic queues. As a result, carriers who install the switch in their networks could assign numerous service levels -- everything from "virtual leased lines" with nearly guaranteed continuous throughput down to pure best-effort service -- to different queues and standarize them as service offerings to customers. The key to Lucent's approach is that by going to Layer 4, the switch will examine each packet for the TCP protocol as well as the IP header. As a result, it will base traffic decisions on such application-oriented information as the "type of service" bit, explained Frank Dzubeck, president of Communications Network Architects, Inc., a consulting firm in Washington, D.C. "It will look at the entire header, including what precedes the IP header, and execute based on what's in the actual content of the packet," Dzubeck said. For example, the switch could automatically recognize that the traffic is an IP telephony call, a video stream or an extremely delay-sensitive terminal-to-host session. If so, it would give the traffic a clean path through the IP network, while more delay-tolerant file transfers and messages wait. By contrast, the Cisco 12000 GSR looks at a predefined set of six to eight "precedence bits" that roughly indicate the priority of each packet, Dzubeck said. Both Lucent and Cisco are claiming the ability to scale up to terabit speeds for upcoming releases of their respective IP switching platforms. Lucent officials called the PacketStar switch "revolutionary," but end-user benefits -- in terms of new carrier and ISP services keyed off the switch -- could be a ways off. "The carriers are going to waltz into this," Dzubeck cautioned. "The trials are going to last a long time." To try to move carriers along more quickly, Lucent also announced new large-capacity IP access servers to compete with products such as those from Ascend Communications, Inc. that are popular with ISPs, as well as voice-to-data gateways. The new IP products are significant for Lucent because, until now, its data networking strategy has been heavily focused on ATM switches for the enterprise and carriers. Some large ISPs and Internet backbone providers are antagonistic toward ATM because they consider the protocol to contain a "cell tax" - a 5-byte header on every 53-byte cell, regardless of whether the payload is voice, data or video - and thus wasteful of bandwidth. Lucent began diversifying away from ATM in the local area with its purchase last year of Prominet Corp., a Gigabit Ethernet switch vendor. Analysts said yesterday's announcement proves Lucent is eager to pursue both ATM and native IP strategies side-by-side in the enterprise WAN and carrier markets, just as it will be offering both ATM and high-speed Ethernet switching in LANs and campus networks. Contact Senior Editor David Rohde Feedback \| Network World, Inc. \| Sponsor Index Marketplace Index \| How to Advertise \| Copyright Home \| NetFlash \| This Week \| Industry/Stocks Buyer's Guides/Tests \| Net Resources \| Opinions \| Careers Seminars & Events \| Product Demos/Info Audio Primers \| IntraNet

To: djane who wrote (47672)	5/28/1998 2:45:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 61433

Hughes to adopt Torrent gigabit router nwfusion.com By Tim Greene Network World Fusion, 5/28/98 Hughes Network Systems will private-label Torrent Networking Technologies' IP900 gigabit router as part of Hughes' plan to provide service quality guarantees for varying traffic types across IP, frame relay and ATM WANs. The router, which Hughes will call the IXR5000, fits into Hughes' quality of service (QoS) scheme by routing traffic that requires merely best effort from the WAN. Other traffic will be switched across the wide area via frame relay and ATM switches. The Hughes QoS architecture incorporates network access devices, a policy server, the IXR5000 router and Hughes' frame relay and ATM switches that support four QoS levels. Traffic entering the WAN goes through an access device that checks with a separate policy server, known as the director, to determine what QoS the access device should request for the traffic. If the traffic demands best effort, it is queued to a router. Otherwise, the access device requests a switched virtual circuit to carry the traffic across the network. Hughes' frame relay switches can translate the four QoS levels to ATM service qualities so the service level can be maintained across a hybrid frame-ATM network. IXR5000 will ship in August for $40,000 to $100,000, depending on configuration. Contact Senior Editor Tim Greene Details of IP9000 from Torrent. Companies to Watch: Stirring a router rival Torrent's play for Cisco territory. Network World, 12/29/97 The really big router battle Network World, 12/29/97 Torrent debuts with gigabit router for the enterprise Network World, 9/22/97 Feedback \| Network World, Inc. \| Sponsor Index Marketplace Index \| How to Advertise \| Copyright Home \| NetFlash \| This Week \| Industry/Stocks Buyer's Guides/Tests \| Net Resources \| Opinions \| Careers Seminars & Events \| Product Demos/Info Audio Primers \| IntraNet

To: djane who wrote (47672)	5/28/1998 3:05:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 61433

Good article on high costs in European telecom zdnet.com Cheapest Network Is Indirect Line By Will Rodger, Inter@ctive WeekMay 25, 1998 Say your company has offices in France. Say, too, you want to set up a high-speed network from Paris to London. Logic says the wires should run from one capital to the next. But reality says something else. Instead of paying for lines from London to Paris, you'd actually save money by sending all that traffic to the U.S. and back again over U.S.-owned networks. In all, data travels 500 times as far for one-tenth the cost, even though all sides agree that actual costs for equipment and services are roughly equal in the U.S. and Europe. Why are prices different? Chalk it up to monopoly power. "It's expensive for historic reasons. People wanted to protect the European [phone monopolies] from the American giants," says Ian Dixon, president of the European Internet Service Providers Association. "We need to solve this problem." To do that, EuroISPA is holding a two-day conference in Brussels, Belgium, June 4-5. There, Internet service providers (ISPs), hardware makers and software developers will huddle with members of the European Parliament, telecom ministers from the European Commission and others to talk about how to cut prices. Perversely, Dixon says, protectionist policies that guaranteed prosperity for the phone monopolies are hobbling the European telecom sector today. When every phone company had a monopoly, it could charge whatever it wished. And since governments owned them, they generally charged heavily to fill public coffers and provide jobs with security - a guarantee that foreigners would be kept out sealed the deal. But the growth of international communications has exposed a weakness in those arrangements. International tariffs to the U.S. are still lower than intracontinental rates. As a result, ISPs and large corporations buy 45 megabit-per-second lines to the U.S. for Net service instead of lines within the continent. Those circuits cost a staggering $450,000 per month for what amounts to local service. U.S. ISPs, by contrast, typically charge $4,000 monthly for a similar domestic connection. Problems don't end there, though. In addition to facing high rates for intracontinental traffic, European ISPs subsidize European telcos every time they buy a line to the U.S. because, by law, European telecom monopolies get half the fees paid for the line. U.S. companies, in turn, use those fat overseas rates to subsidize their forays into Europe. The solution? More competition, like the free market that was supposed to start in Europe Jan. 1. As in the U.S., though, incumbents move slowly to hook their networks to rivals'. EuroISPA can be reached at www.euroispa.org

To: djane who wrote (47672)	5/28/1998 3:18:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 61433

Lucent steals march on Nortel with new switch canoe.com Thursday, May 28, 1998 By PHILIP DEMONT Telecom Reporter The Financial Post U.S. telecommunications equipment manufacturer Lucent Technologies Inc. unveiled new products yesterday to send data and voice signals over the Internet or private networks, a move that could threaten Canadian rival Northern Telecom Ltd. Nortel is working on communications switches and transmission equipment to chase this lucrative market. But Lucent, the former equipment arm of AT&T Corp., appears to be first off the mark, industry watchers said. "Now, Lucent has all, or damn near all, the pieces," said John Celentano of Skyline Marketing Group Inc., a consultancy based in Owings Mills, Md. Its new products include a computer switch and an access server that combine phone calls with Internet data traffic on a single network, allowing phone companies and Internet service providers to offer more local and long-distance services. U.S. long-distance companies such as MCI Communications Corp. and AT&T Corp., along with the Baby Bells and newer telecommunications providers like Qwest Communications International Inc. want the equipment to enable them to offer more profitable voice and data services to businesses. Lucent is eyeing a larger share of the data transmission market, estimated to be worth more than US$20 billion in North America by 2001. For its part, Nortel couldn't understand why industry analysts were so excited by Lucent's announcement yesterday. "I don't see where Lucent is ahead of us," said Glenn Falcao, general manager of public data networks. His company has already introduced a faster switch than what Lucent unveiled, he said. Lucent shares (LU/NYSE) closed at US$72, up US1 7/8. Nortel (NTL/TSE) ended the day at $93, down $1. -- with files from Bloomberg CANOE home \| We welcome your feedback. Copyright c 1998, Canoe Limited Partnership. All rights reserved. Please click here for full copyright terms and restrictions.

To: djane who wrote (47672)	5/28/1998 3:29:00 PM
From: djane	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 61433

TD Securities report. LU/ASND acquisition discussion (via NN thread) To: CJS (4647 ) From: CJS Thursday, May 28 1998 2:13PM ET Reply # of 4666 This is an exerpt from Investors Digest, quoting from TD Securities. Reads as follows... How to play the networking industry mergers Buy Northern Telecom, 3Com Systems and Newbridge Networks to take advantage of changes in the industry. (From a recent report by analysts David Beck and Paul Litva) The telecom and datacom industries have historically been separate. We believe they will consolidate into a "networking industry" as technologies, markets and companies merge. As part of this consolidation, we expect mergers and acquisitions involving major telecom and datacom companies to take place over the next 12 months. The companies most likely to be affected by this include Northern Telecom Ltd.(Nortel), Lucent Technologies Inc., Cisco Systems Inc., Newbridge Networks Corp., Ascend Communications Inc., 3Com Corp. and Bay Neyworks Inc. There are three primary drivers of these mergers and acquisitions. 1) The recognition by major telecom vendors that future communications networks will be datacentric or based on packet technologies. 2) The emergence of Cisco as a datacom superpower. Other major telecom and datacom players now recognize the threats this company represents. 3) The advantage that major telecom vendors have in their longterm relationships with existing carrier distribution channels. If the activity in telecom services or the financial industry provides any guidance, the share prices of all these companies could rise based on speculation about mergers and acquisitions. Investors should buy shares in the companies most likely to be acquired - perhaps with a basket approach. These companies are (in order of highest to lowest probability) Ascend, 3Com, Newbridge and Bay Networks. We believe that Lucent will acquire at least one of these companies to beef up its datacom products and channels. Futhermore, Siemens A.G. may attempt to "acquire Newbridge" as other events in the industry unfold. 3Com could merge with or acquire Newbridge with the objective of building a stonger product portfolio and channel capability to compete with Cisco, Nortel and Lucent. This would add value to both 3Com and Newbridge. ----------------------------------------------------------- Thought this might be of interest to everyone. Regards...