News Release

Cisco Supplies Carrier-Class AS5800 Access Servers to Hongkong Telecom

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- May 13, 1998 -- Cisco Systems, Inc.
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May 13, 1998

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- May 13, 1998 -- Cisco Systems, Inc. today announced that it has supplied Hongkong Telecom with carrier-class Cisco AS5800 universal access servers to support an advanced dial access service for Internet service providers (ISPs) and corporate customers. Hongkong Telecom is using the Cisco AS5800 universal access servers as the platform for its 24-hour Virtual Private Dialup Service (VPDS), which becomes fully operational this month.

Hongkong Telecom selected Cisco AS5800 universal access servers after detailed evaluation by its Network Services Group. VPDS supports connections over public Frame Relay and ATM networks, allowing customers to link their networks to Hongkong Telecom's remote access servers without costly up-front expenses.

Frankie Sum, Cisco Systems general manager for Greater China, explained that by outsourcing dial access to Hongkong Telecom and leveraging the strengths of the Cisco AS5800, enterprises can reduce operational costs while improving the quality of remote access services. "Cisco IOS. software that runs on the AS5800 enables us to deliver a wide range of differentiated services. These include dialup virtual private networking, multiple class-of-service levels and multicast services. It also offers management capabilities for auditing calls, logging of events and detailed billing," said Sum.

The Cisco AS5800's support of Signaling System 7 (SS7) allows service providers to integrate dial access into network infrastructures. This helps reduce costs, off-loads voice switches and enables the network to scale rapidly and cost effectively. Using SS7, service providers can offer dial outsourcing services, often with 50 percent lower capital costs, compared with Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) primary rate interface (PRI) solutions. Moreover, service providers can scale to central office-sized points of presence (POPs) of more than 10,000 ports.

The Cisco AS5800 is the latest addition to Cisco's AS5x00 family of universal access servers. It supports voice-over-IP and fax-over-IP services and provides the highest concentration of modem and ISDN terminations for a single remote access concentrator product.

"Implementing a remote access capability into existing networks can be complex and costly," said Carol Wan, manager of the Corporate Market Branch for Hongkong Telecom. "There is the added burden of managing equipment, as well as ongoing costs for hardware support, software upgrades and staff to support efficient operations. VPDS helps ISPs and corporate customers minimize the trouble and expense of integrating a remote access capability into their current computing environments."

As the outsourcing service provider, Hongkong Telecom will manage networking needs, including hardware and software support, as well as assign manpower to maintain 24-hour operations. The service supports K56FLEX and X2 communications standards, delivering fast 56 kbps transfer rates over analog phone lines. For advanced ISPs, the service offers ISDN connections at 128 kbps.

Service providers such as Hongkong Telecom require high availability and carrier-class management for their complex dial POPs, so the Cisco AS5800 has been designed for a mean time between failure (MTBF) greater than 500,000 hours. Equipped with hot-swappable cards, power and blower assemblies, redundant and load-sharing power supplies, fans and modems, the Cisco AS5800 provides availability at 99.999 percent, which equates to less than five minutes of downtime per year.

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* Virtual Private Dial-up Service is provided by Hongkong Telecom CSL Limited.

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