Globalcomm 2006 - CHICAGO - June 5, 2006 - Cisco Systems® today announced significant enhancements to its Cisco® 7600 Series Router portfolio to increase network intelligence, flexibility and return on investment for service providers and their Cisco Internet Protocol Next-Generation Networks (IP NGNs). These innovations include multicast connection admission control (CAC) capability to more efficiently deliver video services and an integrated video/IPTV quality-monitoring module to improve the delivery of high-quality video services. In addition, new standards-based Ethernet operations, administration and maintenance (OA&M) capabilities enable improved service assurance for all Ethernet-based services, and a new integrated mesh Wireless Service Module (WiSM) for metropolitan Wi-Fi mesh network aggregation enables providers to more efficiently expand their service portfolios utilizing existing 7600 Series Router deployments.

"Swisscom found that for deploying IPTV services at the edge of the network, Layer 3 routing technologies become important for reasons of consistent failure recovery, efficient multicasting and control of packet loss. Swisscom therefore decided to deploy Cisco technology to deliver high-quality IPTV traffic across the network," said Urs Bratschi, Head of Network Development at Swisscom Fixnet. "As one of our key network components we selected the Cisco 7600 because of its rich Layer 2 and Layer 3 functionality."

"We have built one of the largest Carrier Ethernet converged networks in the world to deliver entertainment and business grade services across India. In building our network, we were looking for solutions that can not only help us manage the services and subscriber levels that we have now, but that will continue to do so well into the future," said M.R. Madhusudhan, chief network officer at Videsh Sanchar Nigam Limited (VSNL), a part of the Tata Group. "Advanced Cisco 7600 innovations like multicast connection admission control and video quality monitoring will only increase in importance as our IPTV and other newer services are launched."

Cisco has shipped more than 30,000 of its 7600 Series Routers to service providers including AT&T, BellSouth, China Telecom, COLT, Cox Communications, neuf cegetel, Tata, Time Warner Telecom, Vodafone and Video Networks Limited (VNL).

"As the aggregator for a wide variety of business and consumer service delivery, aggregation layer routing devices need to be flexible, scalable, and reliable and offer provider investment protection over time," said Eve Griliches, Research Manager, IDC. "The Cisco 7600 Series family of routers has long helped providers meet their needs in these areas, and the enhancements announced today help ensure that it will continue to do so."

Service Intelligence - Multicast Connection Admission Control (CAC) for IPTV

Cisco now offers integrated Multicast Connection Admission Control (CAC) on the 7600 Series Routers to deliver a high-quality user experience even when demand for video results in network oversubscription, a scenario that will become increasingly common as IPTV systems are more broadly deployed and subscriber numbers rise.

Service providers can avoid the need to permanently provision their networks with the bandwidth required to handle occasional peaks by deploying a CAC solution to handle those peaks. This approach reduces capital investment and helps ensure a high-quality user experience.

The new Cisco multicast and previously announced video-on-demand (VoD) CAC solutions distinguish among paid VoD, free VoD, specific high-demand broadcast channels and many other video deliverables, enabling providers to improve control of their resources and enhance the user experience.

Service Assurance - Video Quality Monitoring; Fault Detection with Standards-based Ethernet Operations, Administration and Maintenance (OA&M) and IP/MPLS Resiliency

Ethernet is increasingly recognized as the wide-area-network (WAN) technology of choice for IP NGNs and service assurance is critical as service providers build entertainment- and business-grade systems. The Cisco service-assurance solution includes the monitoring, detection and resiliency capabilities needed to provide service availability, increase service velocity, allow autoconfiguration of equipment and ease end-to-end deployment through connectivity fault management and link-level protection.

New capabilities include:

• Video Quality-Monitoring Module - The Cisco Network Analysis Module monitors video streams in real time and sends proactive alerts to providers if picture quality is degraded, enabling them to determine the cause of the degradation and correct it before call centers are overwhelmed.
• Fault Detection - 7600 Series Routers now support IEEE 802.1ag and IEEE 802.3ah standards. IEEE 802.1ag enables providers to manage customer-service instances individually, alerting them when an Ethernet virtual connection (EVC) or virtual local-area network (VLAN) fails and providing the tools to rapidly isolate the failure. IEEE 802.3ah enables link monitoring for critical events and puts the remote device into "loopback" mode in order to test it when events occur. It also discovers unidirectional links, which occur when transmission fails in only one direction.
• IP/MPLS Resiliency - IP/Multiprotocol Label Switching provides added support for nonstop forwarding with stateful switchover (NSF/SSO) and ensures availability even if the control plane fails. The 7600 Series Routers also offer MPLS link protection and pseudowire redundancy for Layer 2 failover.

Fixed/Wireless Network Convergence - Mesh Wi-Fi Service Module (WiSM)

The Cisco 7600 Series Wireless Services Module (WiSM) provides integrated Wi-Fi access-point aggregation, enabling providers to scale and manage metropolitan Wi-Fi mesh networks. The WiSM supports Lightweight Access Point Protocol (LWAPP) and also provides extensive integrated security capabilities like Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA2), and various types of Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP), including Protected EAP (PEAP). The module also improves wireless security through rogue access-point detection and containment and support of a wireless intrusion-prevention system to provide consistent security-policy enforcement across the entire fixed/wireless network.

The Cisco WiSM is easily integrated with existing Cisco 7600 Series Routers and enables convergence of Wi-Fi, mobile (IP Radio Access Network, packet data serving node/gateway GPRS support node) and fixed (Layer 2 and 3) networks for flexible advanced service aggregation.

"The 7600 Series has long been host to market-leading innovations, including mobility integration, Layer 2 and Layer 3 service flexibility and video-aware networking for triple-play service development and delivery," said Tony Bates, senior vice president of routing and service provider technology at Cisco. "Today's announcements further our momentum in working closely with service providers to help ensure they have the technology they need to develop and deploy advanced IP services, and that the investments they make in Cisco platforms they deploy are protected through ongoing enhancement."

For more information, please visit the Cisco Website: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/netsol/ns537/networking_solutions_announcement0900aecd8049afd0.html