Deal Ensures Cisco FDDI Customers of Continued Product Availability andSupport
Dallas, TX, June 6, 1996 -- InterphaseCorporation (NASDAQ/NMS: INPH), a leader in high-performanceadapter cards for technologies including ATM, FDDI and Fibre Channel, hassigned an agreement to purchase Cisco Systems' FDDI network adapter cardproduct line.
According to the agreement, Interphase will acquire the rights to all ofCisco's SBus and EISA FDDI adapters. As part of the deal, for a minimum of two years, Interphase will continue to supply current customers the same products with the same modelnumber designations as they are buying from Cisco today. Cisco will continue to offer SMARTnet customer support for these FDDI adapter models sold by Interphase. Interphase will be acceptingorders beginning June 10, 1996 and Cisco will stop shipping theirSBus and EISA FDDI products on July 28, 1996.
This agreement builds on a prior Cisco-Interphase relationship in whichthe two companies worked together to provide interoperability between CiscoATM switches and routers, and Interphase ATM adapters. Financial terms ofthe agreement were not disclosed.
"Our primary goal in choosing an FDDI partner was to look out for thelong-term interests of our customers," said Jayshree Ullal, director ofmarketing, Workgroup Business Unit, Cisco Systems. "Interphase is an idealFDDI partner for Cisco because the company is well-established in the FDDInetworking adapter card business. Interphase offers quality and long-termcommitment to the FDDI NICs and our customer base."
According to Stephen Polley, Interphase president and CEO, theInterphase acquisition of the Cisco FDDI adapter line is significant for acouple of reasons. "The addition of the Cisco adapters adds complimentaryproducts to our existing FDDI portfolio, already the industry's broadestline of FDDI products available from a single vendor. This acquisitionsolidifies our leadership position in FDDI. Secondly, Cisco customers cancontinue to purchase, and receive support for, their existing FDDI adaptersand driver software utilized on the SBus and EISA platforms in their FDDInetworks.
SBus and EISA FDDI Cards
The Cisco EISA and SBus FDDI adapters feature high performance 32-bitwide architectures with 128K on-board packet memory, 128K flash memory, andutilize the Motorola 68340 processor for on-board SMT protocol handling. Inaddition, both adapters come in single attach (SAS) or dual attach (DAS)configurations with support for fiber or copper (CDDI) media connectivity.Driver support for the SBus adapters includes SunOS and Solaris. The EISAadapters include driver support for NetWare, Windows NT, HP-UX, IRIX andNDIS.
Product Support
"Both Cisco and Interphase are working to ensure customers that therewill be a seamless transition of product and support," continued Polley."With our leadership position in FDDI, customers will continue to see theexpertise and service that this marketplace demands."
Customers will have several support options. Cisco and Interphase willcooperate on customer support for these products. Customers who purchasedFDDI adapters from Cisco will have the option to obtain warranty supportfrom either Cisco or Interphase. Cisco will continue to offer SMARTnetsupport agreements for these FDDI models, regardless of whether theadapters were purchased from Cisco or from Interphase.
Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the leading global supplier ofinternetworking solutions for corporate intranets and the global Internet.Cisco's products, including routers, LAN and ATM switches, dial-up accessservers and network management software, are integrated by the Cisco IOSsoftware to link geographically dispersed LANs, WANs and IBM networks.Company news and product/service information are available at World WideWeb site http://www.cisco.com.Cisco is headquartered in San Jose, California.
Interphase Corporation is a leading supplier of desktop and server I/Oproducts for high speed technologies including ATM, FDDI, Fibre Channel andFast Ethernet. The company shipped the industry's first commercial FDDIadapter and today enjoys a majority marketshare for high end server FDDIinterface cards. Interphase was recently ranked as the #2 supplier of ATMadapters in North America by Dataquest (June 1995). Headquartered inDallas, Texas, Interphase sells to OEMs, distributors and systemsintegrators through a worldwide sales and service network. Additionalinformation about Interphase and its products is available at World WideWeb site http://www.iphase.com.
SMARTnet is a trademark of Cisco Systems. All other trademarks areproperty of their respective owners.
