Cisco Systems stays at the top of the market for network switches thanks to upgrades and new features.
San Francisco, California Ten October 2006: After a slow third quarter, Cisco Systems is now the market leader for 10 Gigabit Ethernet switches in the fourth quarter. Cisco made big gains in a market worth more than $300 million because there was more demand and the average selling price went up overall.
With almost 70% of the projected $1.3 billion 10-Gig market share and a design that is both more powerful and more affordable, the Catalyst 6500 is set to solidify Cisco's position as the industry leader. With the release of a 10-Gigabit Ethernet module with eight ports for the 6500, Cisco is quickly pulling ahead of the competition.
Also, upgrades like the Application Control Engine (ACE) module have led companies like Pure Video Networks to use Cisco switches to manage the traffic on their popular video websites. The ACE module has the best performance in the industry because it implements multiple data centre services at once, such as server load balancing, integrated network and application switching/security, and server load balancing. The ACE simplifies application infrastructure by combining the functions of multiple application delivery appliances into a single module. These functions include server load balancing and off-load, Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocol, security, and application optimization.
The 6500 Series is already the most popular networking switch on the IT market. It reduces operational costs and makes it easier for a network to meet high bandwidth demands. Customers who use the services modules for the Catalyst 6500 can lower their total cost of ownership by taking advantage of the simplified infrastructure, better investment protection, pervasive security, and high levels of performance, scalability, and new technologies.
The Catalyst 6500 is one of the most scalable and high-performance platforms for integrated services. It has more than twenty different service modules in five different groups. At the moment, Cisco has modules that can be added to existing catalyst switches that deal with security issues, applications, networking, network monitoring, wireless/mobility, and IP communications. Each module improves performance and helps Cisco keep its lead in the network switch market. Since it came out in 1999, the 6500 Series switch has made more than $20 billion in sales. This makes it the most popular networking platform ever.
Even though Cisco has been able to keep most competitors at bay, rival Foundry Networks and newcomer Force 10 have recently released new 10Gbe-ready products that are designed to cut into Cisco's market share. According to information about Force 10's Terascale E-Series 1200, the E1200 has more than twice as many Ethernet ports as the Catalyst 6500. This could be good news for the company, but Force 10 has been focusing on the data centre market, so it hasn't been tested in the enterprise market yet. The BigIron RX series switch from Foundry has gotten good reviews for how small it is compared to how well it works and how cheap it is. With the release of the new RX series, Foundry has continued to challenge Cisco's uncontested rule.
Even though Cisco's competitors are making new moves, IT professionals whose networks depend on Cisco's equipment still give it a lot of weight. Luckily for Cisco, having a good reputation is still the best way to lead the market.
