Siemens AG and Newbridge Networks Inc have invited 3Com Corp into their asynchronous transfer mode alliance, and at the Networld + Interop show in Atlanta yesterday announced a range of products under the label Carrier Scale Internetworking, or CSI. The CSI products are an expansion of the existing Newbridge MainStreamXpress line of ATM switches, routers and network management tools, designed to turn them into an IP routing architecture which is sufficiently capable, scalable and reliable enough to meet the requirements of carrier IP network traffic. The standards-based architecture – basically a set of management and service policies – is designed to enable telecommunications carriers to offer their corporate customers support for IP-based intranets or extranets, or virtual private networks. 3Com Corp will also be adding support for the CSI architecture into its own products, such as its CoreBuilder switch and Transcend Enterprise Manager network management software. Existing users, including the installed base of 5,000 MainStream ATM switches, can be upgraded to support CSI. Back in July, 3Com signed a five year pact with Siemens to collaborate on voice over IP products (CI No 3,201). The move confirms a trend started by the collaboration of Cisco Systems Inc and Alcatel NV (CI No 3,188), and expected to be supplemented soon by a closer team-up between Bay Network Inc and Lucent Technologies Inc, that sees the networking companies pushing into the world of telecommunications.
