MELBOURNE, Australia - July 27, 2004 - Victoria's Monash University is deploying a Cisco Systems® Gigabit Ethernet communications network to enable video learning, improved research facilities and more secure computing access to more than 20,000 users across 20 sites.

The network, one of the largest in Australia, will provide Monash University's staff and students access to the network at gigabit speeds, or 1000 megabits per second-up to 100 times the bandwidth available on the existing network.

The migration to Cisco® gigabit-speed networking, featuring intelligent Quality of Service and security mechanisms, will help the university to deliver the next generation of innovative curriculum supporting technologies such as video on demand and e-learning applications. It will also enhance Monash's access to international research data and computing grids.

Neil Clarke, Monash University network manager said; "Higher education is all about information and the exchange of information between academic staff, students and researchers. We wanted to provide our staff and students with world-class communications and we also wanted those resources to be secure across the campus. That is why we worked with Cisco."

The information security strategy adopted by Monash is based on the concept of the Cisco Self-Defending Network, a Cisco initiative that aims to protect an organisation end to end, through dynamic responses against internal and external attacks.

Cisco's managing director for Australia and New Zealand, Ross Fowler, said; "The Gigabit Ethernet network which Monash University is deploying is an example of what Cisco sees as the 'intelligent information network.' It will provide the intelligent infrastructure for the current and future information services that Monash chooses to deploy so that the network lasts longer, is faster and is smarter."

The Monash University next-generation project consists of Cisco Catalyst® 6500 Series core switching products and more than a thousand Cisco Catalyst 3750G edge and distribution switches. A number of the intercampus links have also been upgraded using Cisco's coarse wavelength-division multiplexing (CWDM) interfaces on the Catalyst 3750G switches. CWDM allows up to eight simultaneous gigabit connections to run over a single pair of fibres that could normally only handle one.