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Globalcomm Booth # 47026 Hammerhead Systems Announces Availability of Industry’s First Multi-Segment Pseudowire and Pseudowire Switching Implementations IETF “Draft Swallow” Implementation also Available GLOBALCOMM 2006 – Chicago, IL – June 5, 2006 – Hammerhead Systems, Inc., today announced the availability of Multi-Segment Pseudowires and Pseudowire Switching functionality on the HSX 6000 Layer 2.5 Aggregation Switch in response to specific tier 1 service provider customer requirements. With the industry’s first availability of these capabilities, Hammerhead’s customers have greater scalability, management simplicity, and enhanced network security over incumbent offerings. Hammerhead’s implementation of Multi-Segment Pseudowires and Pseudowire Switching elevates the technology from simple packet encapsulation into both a carrier-deployable service and an important element in traffic engineering and multi-provider networking applications. It has been demonstrated in service provider trials and is available today. Hammerhead also announced its implementation of ATM PNNI to MPLS Pseudowire interworking (draft Swallow) on the HSX 6000 Layer 2.5 Aggregation Switch to provide true service interworking between next-generation MPLS networks and legacy ATM networks in a seamless, standards-based solution. “To the extent that fixed and mobile service providers look to integrate legacy operations with the converged IP/MPLS core, Hammerhead’s ability to offer standards-based interworking between the MPLS and ATM control planes on a single network element – the HSX 6000 – is a capability our customers have found to be both operationally and financially compelling,” said Peter Savage, Hammerhead’s President and CEO. Hammerhead’s implementation of the draft Swallow is available today. In their efforts to converge all services onto a common IP network, service providers have continued to push equipment vendors to provide innovative cost-effective solutions for extending manageable service relationships across IP networks and into metro and access networks. In response, the IETF’s PWE3 working group has addressed key issues that facilitate the use of MPLS Pseudowires as the service construct for encapsulation and mapping of a broad array of Layer 2 services over MPLS. Service providers have asked equipment vendors to address the interconnection of endpoints located on different access networks in a scalable, secure and operationally tractable manner. The IETF’s draft for Multi-Segment Pseudowires allows a service provider to extend Pseudowires across multiple domains and tunnels. With the introduction of Pseudowire Switching, service providers can scale connections in the access network without impacting the control plane, avoiding the typical “n2” mesh connectivity problem in mapping connections across a network. With Hammerhead’s implementation of Multi-Segment Pseudowires and Pseudowire Switching available today on the HSX 6000, the company offers the industry’s first production-ready solution. Multi-Segment Pseudowires (MS-PW) also address inter-carrier interconnections, a key area of concern for service providers. By extending Pseudowires across service provider boundaries, Multi-Segment Pseudowires help address confidentiality and security requirements, and provide interworking between disparate tunneling technologies used in different networks. Hammerhead’s implementation supports static and dynamic placement of Multi-Segment Pseudowires on the HSX 6000. Multi-Segment Pseudowires work as two or more contiguous Pseudowire segments that function as a single point-to-point virtual connection. In a MS-PW, the service provider edge connection is dynamically created by signaling, and is not configured by the end user. Multi-Segment Pseudowires can be routed across multiple carrier networks or multiple domains in a single network, based on business-based route metrics rather than on purely technical metrics, a key requirement for common carriers in converged service applications. In light of the recent wave of consolidation among service providers, the interconnection of various networks and network domains is an important element of streamlining operations. Pseudowires enable the mapping of Layer 2 attributes that are critical to SLA enforcement and deterministic QoS guarantees to IP flows. This facilitates the aggregation of a variety of incoming traffic from the access network to a single IP-based network core. Hammerhead’s solution elevates the technology from simple packet encapsulation into a carrier-deployable service, particularly across demarcation interfaces and in applications that demand explicit control of the service path. These applications require call admission control (CAC) and inter-carrier routing policy. The Hammerhead implementation optimizes the number of targeted LDP sessions that are required. It enables service providers to set up Pseudowires through multiple networks, using LDP and Generic FEC within the control-plane. “Hammerhead has been unique among equipment vendors for recognizing the importance of networked pseudowires in creating converged services, particularly across multiple provider hops,” said Tom Nolle, president of CIMI Corporation, a New Jersey consultancy. “These announcements are a significant step in making pseudowires a tool in service creation and management for new-generation IP networks.” In a second area of innovation leadership, Hammerhead’s implementation of PNNI-Pseudowire Interworking, consistent with the IETF draft Swallow, enables service providers to migrate revenue-generating traffic resident on legacy ATM networks to the MPLS core, and facilitates the introduction of advanced Ethernet-based services to existing customers. Hammerhead is delivering its standards-based implementation on a single network element, the HSX 6000, consolidating functions that have historically required separate switches and routers with proprietary implementations. The service provider market has demonstrated significant demand for Hammerhead’s HSX 6000 platform. With its innovative architecture, including Bandwidth Pooling (patent pending), 1:N Redundancy scheme, and technology leadership in Pseudowires and QoS, Hammerhead offers service providers flexible, innovative and cost-effective solutions to support their network expansions, and to accelerate their deployment of Ethernet-based enhanced services. The HSX 6000 delivers a patent-pending Bandwidth Pooling architecture to virtualize key switch resources and eliminate stranded capacity. Its Service Agile Ports enable flexible software provisioning of any physical port for a variety of services and data rates. The Service Interworking Engine allows service providers to introduce new Ethernet-based services to their existing Frame Relay and ATM customers. The HSX 6000 offers extensive support for Ethernet (native GigE and EoS) as well as legacy services (FR, ATM, PPP, HDLC, & POS). Its unique Dual Control Plane architecture gives service providers the flexibility to commission a single edge platform connected simultaneously to their MPLS & ATM networks, providing key service interworking functions at the data plane as well as the control plane. Hammerhead is showcasing the HSX 6000 platform and Pegador SOA EMS in Booth# 47026 with demonstrations highlighting Pseudowire and QoS provisioning, Ethernet service delivery and operational ease of use. About Hammerhead Systems |
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