Paris, October 30, 2002 - Cisco Systems today announced that LDCOM Networks has selected Cisco Metro Ethernet Switching to deliver Ethernet-based connectivity services to both businesses and service providers across France. LDCOM already provides Ethernet VPN connectivity across its fiber network to service providers and is now extending the offer to businesses in 30 metropolitan areas in France.

LDCOM has built a 11,000 km of national fiber backbone in France using rights of way beside waterways, through pipelines, transport infrastructure, and has worked closely with local and regional authorities in France to extend its fiber coverage in metropolitan areas.

'We were the first operator in France to offer Ethernet VPN services more than a year ago and are now extending our coverage to target enterprises as well as operators,' commented Michel Paulin, executive senior VP, for LDCOM. 'Many customers want us to connect several sites together with high bandwidth connectivity, for which our Gigabit Ethernet and VPN solution provides a flexible offer.'

Paulin continued: 'The beauty of the Ethernet service is that we can use software to increase or decrease the bandwidth provided to customers in a granular way from 1Mbps up to Gigabit speeds. The software-based approach to altering the amount of bandwidth provisioned to customers is much more flexible than the forklift network upgrades associated with traditional SDH networks, and is key to helping us to reduce the ongoing operational cost of our network.'

In addition to inter-site Ethernet VPN connectivity, LDCOM offers MPLS-based IP VPN services across its network. With the new Metro network, LDCOM is offering Ethernet last mile connectivity to businesses directly on fiber, coupled with Ethernet and MPLS VPN in the core network backbone.

"LDCOM's service offer is reflecting the growing interest shown by businesses in France to be able to scale the capacity of their inter-site connectivity beyond the current limits of SDH, and lay a foundation for rolling out voice over IP," commented Michael Bayer, director service provider marketing, EMEA for Cisco Systems. "Given the choice, enterprises want to be able to buy the amount of bandwidth they need, not be constrained by the bandwidth packages on offer. Delivering Ethernet to the Business over fiber is an attractive solution both for the service provider and business customer.'

LDCOM selected the Cisco 7600 Series router for Metro Ethernet connectivity in the aggregation layer, along with Cisco Catalyst 3550 switches at customer premises.

About LDCOM

The LDCOM group, which is aiming to provide an ongoing alternative to France Telecom, currently services 50,000 enterprise clients, 820,000 residential customers, 2,000 hosting clients and 200 professional telecoms clients. The group employs 2000 people and will achieve a turnover of a billion Euros in 2003. For more information please contact Frederique Vautel, LDCOM Networks Corporate Communications, at +33 (0) 1 58 63 97 31, frederique.vautel@ldcom.fr