Cisco new innovations for Enterprise Campus Networking

BANGALORE, INDIA: Cisco, the global leader in networking for the Internet has announced the introduction of new modular Catalyst switches, Cisco Catalyst 6500 Virtual Switching System (VSS) 1440 and Cisco Catalyst 4500 E-Series, which will help enable companies to take full advantage of real-time communication and collaboration capabilities to meet business demands and simplify operational management. Cisco’s Catalyst 6500 VSS 1440 and Catalyst 4500 E-Series will help deliver greater productivity and support for richer applications. These solutions will also boost operational efficiency and flexibility, lowering network management overhead, and optimizing network switching resources.

Speaking at the launch, Walt Blomquist, Sr. Director, Marketing, Internet Systems Business Unit, Cisco Inc. said, “Cisco’s continuing investment in modular switching has resulted in innovations in the Catalyst 6500 and 4500 product lines delivering greater productivity and support for richer applications. With this launch, Campus Communications Fabric brings in new attributes such as virtualisation, non-stop communications, operational manageability and unified network services, as business-critical network applications become increasingly interactive and traffic patterns become less predictable.”

The Cisco Campus Communications Fabric is a framework wherein products and features work together to provide highly consistent services and policies, anywhere, anytime, and irrespective of connection type. It covers six areas: application intelligence, unified network services, integrated security, virtualization, non-stop communications, and operational manageability. 

The Catalyst 6500 Virtual Switching System (VSS) 1440 provides network system virtualization – the ability for two switches to act as one switch - providing seamless high-availability, enhanced scalability, and a single switch image to manage.  Upgrading to the new Catalyst 6500 Virtual Switching Supervisor Engine 720 10G enables existing Catalyst 6500 investments and multi-layer switching architectures to be enhanced with VSS capabilities.

Infact, Cisco as a pilot study installed its system at HCL. Reacting to the new product, P. V. Ramadas, Vice President (Technology),  HCL Technologies Ltd.- BPO Services said, ``HCL believes in building a more secure, well-managed and dynamic IT infrastructure that can help reduce overall IT cost, make better use of IT resources and make IT as a strategic growth partner for the business. To create a sustainable IT operations environment across multiple business and geographically distributed delivery centers , we have deployed Cisco Catalyst 6500 Virtual Switching Systems in the core which simplifies operational management and provides unparalleled availability by just swapping the supervisor, ensuring 80 percent of our investment protection.” 

The Cisco Catalyst 4500 E-Series is a next generation extension of the Catalyst 4500 Series. It is a mid-range modular switch for enterprise, small and medium-sized business (SMB) and service provider customers.  The Catalyst 4500 E-Series switch with CenterFlex Technology delivers greatly increased performance, configuration flexibility, and investment protection and enhancement.

"The new Cisco Catalyst 4500 E-Series switches have shown that they have the performance and advanced features to meet our business and technology needs and offer excellent investment protection. For our business, this means that the 4500 E-Series offers resiliency in hardware as well as software that minimizes both planned and unplanned downtime, which is a key requirement of our end customers," said Shyamal Bhattacharya, Vice President, HCL Technologies Ltd.

With tremendous growth in campus networks, companies now need to target richer interactive and more collaborative applications besides availability and reliability. The new switching capabilities will enable companies to complete mix and match of new and existing solutions for backward and forward compatibility further enhancing previous investment.