Aricent Introduces New Data Center Ethernet Software for Telecom Equipment Manufacturers

PALO ALTO, Calif., June 30 /PRNewswire/ -- Aricent®, a global innovation, technology and service company focused exclusively on communications, today announced a new release of its widely deployed Intelligent Switching Solution (ISS) specifically tailored for building Data Center Ethernet equipment. Aricent's ISS is a licensable, pre-packaged software framework that jumpstarts the development and integration of advanced switching products, and has been selected by more than 60 networking and telecom equipment manufacturers worldwide.

The new ISS release includes functions essential to delivering Ethernet in the Data Center including Priority Flow Control (PFC), Enhanced Transmission Selection (ETS), congestion notification and Data Center Bridging Extensions (DCBX). Additional features targeted for the Data Center include VRF, hot-standby for OSPF and PIM, graceful restart, IS-IS integration, and enhancements to private VLAN, ACL, MLDv2, MSDP and IPv6. These capabilities, available in a licensable pre-packaged framework, represent another industry first for Aricent. ISS' Data Center features are compliant with multiple IEEE specifications, including 802.1Qbb, 802.1Qaz and 802.1QAu.

The rise in popularity of virtualization and cloud computing -- within the enterprise and service providers -- has led to a rapid increase in the performance requirements expected from Data Centers, subsequently driving a fundamental re-architecture of the Data Center network. Ethernet has emerged as the de-facto technology to unify communications in the Data Center across both the data and the storage networks. According to Infonetics Research, Data Center Ethernet represents a large and growing market, and the revenue from Data Center switches alone is expected to reach $7 billion in 2014. This represents an increase of nearly $3 billion in annual revenue over today's base and a 10% CAGR over the next few years.

"Ethernet-based infrastructure is at the core of Data Center networks, and thus an ideal technology for consolidating data and storage networking traffic," stated Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst, Enterprise Voice and Data at Infonetics Research. "In order to meet the demands of converged networks, equipment vendors need to introduce interoperable and standards-based products that incorporate the latest Ethernet technology. Software frameworks like Aricent's ISS help equipment vendors meet these new and complex product requirements and accelerate time-to-market."  

Aricent's industry-leading ISS software suite is currently deployed in more than sixty of the world's leading suppliers of advanced switching solutions. The new Data Center feature additions are targeted at networking equipment manufacturers building products in the Data Center and storage markets to enable and extend the capabilities of Ethernet in the Data Center. The deployments for these products range from greenfield build-outs to the integration of different storage architectures such as Fiber Channel and Infiniband onto Ethernet.

Aricent is working closely with equipment manufacturers to deliver technology to power the Data Center Ethernet technology of tomorrow. Aricent's ISS has been chosen by GNodal to deliver its revolutionary Data Center switching products.

"Gnodal has developed a revolutionary Data Center technology that offers a magnitude of improvement in terms of performance while reducing power consumption to a fraction of existing infrastructures," said Tony Ford, COO at Gnodal. "We chose Aricent's ISS to power this technology as its superior performance and extensive feature-set helps us deliver high quality and interoperable Data Center switching products."

Aricent's ISS is hardware and operating system agnostic and can be easily ported to virtually any platform. Furthermore, Aricent has developed reference architectures with leading silicon suppliers, providing a high degree of integration and simplifying product development of today's complex switching solutions.

Aricent offers ISS packages for a variety of applications, from top-of-rack and end-of-row Data Center switches, to simple managed Ethernet switches to industrial Ethernet platforms, from Layer 3 switches with comprehensive routing capabilities, to metro Ethernet/carrier Ethernet applications, such as cellular/mobile backhaul, optical aggregation, DSLAMs, GPON switches, and (Multi Service Access Nodes) MSANs. Aricent offers flexible licensing models to customers, who can take advantage of individual components or any desired combination of hardware and OS. The ISS control plane module offers a complete feature-set including RSTP/MSTP, VLAN, IGMP Snooping, GVRP/GMRP, LA, LACP, MLD Snooping and LLDP. The IP routing features include IPv4, IPv6, RIP, RIPv6, BGP4, OSPF, OSPFv6, IGMP, MLD, PIM and DVMRP. For more information visit: http://www.aricent.com/ISS.

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About Aricent

Aricent is a global innovation, technology and services company focused exclusively on communications. Aricent combines the leading innovation capabilities of frog design with unparalleled domain expertise in communications as a strategic supplier to the world's foremost infrastructure, application and service providers. The company's investors include Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., Sequoia Capital, The Family Office and The Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board. For more information, visit http://www.aricent.com.

Aricent is a trademark of Aricent Inc., in the United States and other jurisdictions. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

SOURCE Aricent