Cisco set the stage to announce the expansion of its ASR 9000 router line a week in advance by releasing its new Visual Networking Index (VNI) Forecast, which predicts fourfold IP traffic growth (reaching the zettabyte global IP threshold) by 2015.
Cisco’s solution for all that traffic? New edge router and aggregation network solutions for network operators that have to handle it -- particularly solutions for video traffic, which Cisco expects to constitute 62% of Internet traffic by 2015.
On hand to discuss their network challenges and lend credibility to the Cisco ASR 9000 upgrade was a cable-heavy panel of Cisco service provider customers that included Comcast and Cox, both of which are moving more to IP and have network buildouts on their drawing boards.
“We have to make sure we’re prepared to support the growth and make sure we have the right cost-reduction equipment as we grow our network,” said Kevin McElearney, senior vice president of network engineering for Comcast. “One of our main focuses is on business services, and the 9000 Series helps us position for advanced business services as we deliver deeper into 20 markets.”
In short, Cisco has announced upgrades to its ASR 9000 product line by increasing edge router capacity and overall network intelligence, and offering a unified view of distributed network elements across wireless and wireline networks. What's garnering the most attention, though, is the technology that extends virtualization to the network through its nV (network virtualization) technology, intended to make network management a simpler task.
“It was critical for Cisco to update the 9000. They’ve lost some market share and needed to show some innovation in that space since the series was introduced in 2008,” said Ray Mota, managing partner of ACG Research. “Cisco has lost market share at the edge, and people have wanted to see something innovative with the ASR.”