CAIRO, Egypt, April 2, 2003, Cisco Systems today announced that Cairo's $750 million Citystars Heliopolis development is using Cisco's Architecture for Voice, Video and Integrated Data (AVVID) as the basis for their IP Communications network infrastructure. The infrastructure will provide the complex's customers with the latest information and communications technology services, including one of the largest IP telephony deployments in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
The network design, proposed by systems integrator Raya, will provide Citystars with an advanced IP Communications infrastructure to match the exacting standards set by the rest of the development. This includes a 150,000 m2 retail and leisure complex, 70,000 m2 of purpose-built office space, 266 premium residential units, a 20,000 m2 international exhibition centre and three world class hotels. In future phases, Cisco AVVID will be the basis for the roll out of additional Cisco technologies to support wireless hotspots, content networking, call centres and other services.
"One of our visions for CITYSTARS was to create an integrated residential, office, and shopping complex whereby all our guests, customers, and tenants would be able to communicate using the latest state-of-the-art IT networks" says Abdulrahman Sharbatly, Chairman and Founder of CITYSTARS. And continues, "as CITYSTARS is the biggest multi-use development in the Middle East and Europe - we knew this would be a challenge and required the very best IT companies to achieve success. The Cisco team impressed us from the start with their determination to understand our business and focus on building a relationship with us, Cisco was also the only technology provider to advocate an integrated network infrastructure for IP Communications, combining voice and data over IP with the proven ability to deliver on its promises."
The Citystars network is built on a scale to match the Pharaonic proportions of the complex itself, which has employed 10,000 workers around the clock for its construction and features three huge pyramids in its commercial centre. The AVVID infrastructure is based on 20 Cisco Catalyst® 6500 series and 300 Catalyst® 3524 series switches. The infrastructure is connected via 45,000 Ethernet ports and in the first phase the overall IP telephony deployment comprises 7,000 IP phones as well as 40 Cisco Media Convergence Server 7835s running Cisco Call Manager for call processing and Cisco Unity for voice messaging.
Yasser Elkady - Country Manger Egypt & North Africa, said: "Citystars aims to be the leading business centre in the Middle East and the network infrastructure we are providing certainly supports that goal. This is undoubtedly one of the most ambitious local area network deployments in the region and we are proud to have been associated with it based on our experience in delivering converged networks."
