3Com has announced that its new partnership with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), resulted in it being selected for the Andhra Pradesh State Wide Area Network (APSWAN) project. Under this deal, 3Com will provide high-end enterprise switching, routing and security offerings for the project that will connect 23 district offices in the state to increase efficiency in government operations.
In September 2009, the Andhra Pradesh government awarded TCS a State Wide Area Network (SWAN) project on a five year build, own, operate, and transfer (BOOT) model. The project will enable the state government to start and run various projects for citizen services to boost G2G and G2C efficiencies that will help transform the e-governance structure.
According to 3Com, its network will enable the state government to communicate and conference across all government offices over VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol), which will reduce communication costs. Applications covering transport, healthcare, education and municipality will also operate on this e-governance network backbone, which is scheduled to be rolled out within 12 months.
Rose Chen, VP and general manager of 3Com Asia Pacific, said: “Being credited for having started the networking industry with the invention of ethernet, 3Com has been on the forefront of innovation. Our mission is to offer world-class products at affordable prices and we have enabled customers to build high-performance and secure networks at a lower total cost.”
Tanmoy Chakrabarty, VP and head government ISU at TCS, said: “We are happy to partner with 3Com for this prestigious project. The network is an important aspect in this ambitious project, which would connect various government offices with common service centers. It is on this network various e-government initiatives would ride and hence is very critical to the overall project.”