By John Mark V. Tuazon
September 1, 2010

Back in the day, Ergie Ong, CIO of PJ Lhuillier Group of Companies (PJL), a national network of more than 1,200 Cebuana Lhuillier pawnshops and remittance centers, recalls that the network requirements of companies are tied to the bare minimum, owing to simple applications being developed for the enterprise, coupled with the fact that telecommunications companies are unable to provide high bandwidth connection to end-users.

But as developments in technology naturally advanced, the demands for a higher-bandwidth network infrastructure became apparent, due to various business applications being developed to help streamline firms’ business processes. “Applications are proliferating and the network is critical for delivering these to business users,” explains Bernie Trudel, technology lead for the data center at Cisco, APAC.

One such application is video, which, according to the latest Visual Networking Index (VNI) conducted by Cisco, will exceed 91% of total global consumer Internet traffic by 2014. Videoconferencing, a tool starting to gain traction within the walls of the enterprise, is set to grow sevenfold within the same time period, the report says.

“Aside from the traditional office automation and businesscritical applications, we are seeing much more voice and video traffic as organizations are increasing their use of media-rich collaboration and social networking applications,” Trudel relates.

FINE-TUNING APPLICATIONS

While large corporations are tripping over themselves in the pursuit of deploying the latest technologies to supposedly improve their business processes, Ong of the PJ Lhuillier Group says they are focusing their strengths on developing fine-tuned applications that exactly meet their business requirements.

“We wanted to make sure that we maintain and pay for cost-effective network solutions,” Ong reiterates. “Given that, our system is based entirely on the minimum lines that we actually use.”

Ong’s development team, he relates, made it a point to minimize data transmission into the system by developing from the ground up a central application that supports and integrates all their products—which include pawning, remittance, insurance, bills payment and electronic loading systems, among others.

With the fine-tuned system, Ong claims they are able to process more than 10,000 of transactions per day using only a low bandwidth line, with that figure going up to about 50,000 transactions per day during peak seasons. Their branch system can process online transactions using dial-up lines when the primary line is down. “With our central in-house application, we can deploy new products in just one to two days, centrally updating it from our data center,” he adds.

The local office of First Advantage Corporation (FADV), a global information processing firm, lives by the same philosophy. Jan Espino, the company’s regional IT manager for Asia Pacific, shares that since their subsidiary’s focus is on employment screening for clients in the region, they only employ a core application that integrates all the functions needed by end-users.

“Our core application is hosted off of our data center in Bangalore, India, and connected using an international MPLS connection,” he explains. The core application developed inhouse automates the screening process, he goes on, and is accessed via a Web browser.

Their core application only uses half of their bandwidth, Espino points out, while the other half is relegated to accessing e-mail and Internet connectivity, which employees mainly use to augment their research materials.

ALLOTTING BANDWIDTH

Using light applications that are not heavy on network bandwidth use is one foolproof solution, but in the interconnected environment of the World Wide Web—where applications such as social networking, video and the like are gaining massive popularity—users are wont to make a significant dent on the network’s performance.

“Communication tools like video conferencing and email generates a steady stream of traffic, which no doubt consumes a significant amount of bandwidth,” says Desmond Toh, marketing director of network devices vendor DLink. “Having the risk of bandwidth competition, this may lead to poor and irregular application response time. These applications can easily saturate available bandwidth and starving other applications.”

Designating specific bandwidth allocations for missioncritical applications and light network requirements, therefore, becomes an all-too important task. PJL’s Ong, in fact, has taken this point to heart, banning the use of social media and other such bandwidth-hungry applications in their offices.

“Our managers asked if we can check if the employees are accessing the Web for work-related activities,” he recalls. “We found out that a lot of people are accessing Facebook, so we denied access to it right away.”

Upon banning the social networking site, Ong shares that there was a significant improvement in their network infrastructure, so they chose to stick with the policy. “But we allow access if users go through the approval process, which sees if the requirements to access the sites are valid,” he adds.

FADV’s Espino has limited the non-official use of the Internet in their company for productivity and security reasons. Among the sites included in their blocked list—which is managed through Active Directory—are video streaming sites, instant messaging applications, external emails, and social networking.

“We have an acceptable use policy which defines what acceptable Internet use is, to make sure users use it judiciously” he says. “We do not have wireless access points where users can just use their laptops with, and we have built firewalls to ensure security is not compromised through the network.”

Espino claims banning these sites do not affect the productivity of their employees, and that in fact, “it should even boost productivity because they are focused with their work.”

EAGLE’S EYE VIEW

Having policies in place ensure that critical business applications are serviced, but ensuring that they are complied with to the letter requires that network administrators monitor activities within their network, to gain visibility about bandwidth pain points within the infrastructure.

“The network management team imperatively requires tools that enable them to control the valuable network resources in order to ensure that each application receives its corresponding level of priority and the most effective use of bandwidth is made,” suggests Cisco’s Trudel.

D-Link’s Toh concurs: “It is important for the organization to have the ability to monitor traffic within the Local Area Network (LAN), the Wide Area Network (WAN), and certain points in the Internet,” he surmises.

In this scenario, the old saying that knowing the problem is half the solution becomes relevant. Without an effective monitoring tool, enterprises would rely solely on users abiding by their policies, or external influences respecting the private use of their infrastructure, which is not always the case.

“Organizations cannot afford their network uptime to be compromised. In order to achieve this, it is essential for companies that have large data networks to monitor network traffic and usage for more efficient troubleshooting when there are outages in the system,” Toh clarifies.

PLJ uses a freeware tool for monitoring their network traffic, Ong shares. “We use it to determine which of our branches go online and offline,” he explains.

Their proactive approach in using apps with small bandwidth requirements bodes well for them as well. “We tend to avoid high-bandwidth requirements, so we make sure our systems use minimal bandwidth,” Ong says, adding that they recently had to turn down a proposition from the management to centrally manage their branches’ CCTV cameras, saying it is not a practical application to use their network for.

D-Link’s Toh says there is wisdom in having a central management for the network, especially in large corporations, “because it is not feasible to execute system checking tasks manually as it is very time consuming.” “The application should be able to perform polling of network/devices status periodically. With the information gathered, they can address the issues accordingly,” he adds.

ALL GROUNDS COVERED

FADV’s Espino says it is best to approach network automation and management in a twopronged approach: employing the best-of-breed network devices that provide bandwidth throttlingand prioritization, among others, and, more importantly, managing the usage of end-users.

“No matter how sophisticated your system is, if users can just install applications, access Facebook, and the like, you will still face congestion,” he points out.

For PJL’s Ong, the best mindset is always expecting failure of the system, where contingencies are necessary. After all, no matter how advanced network technologies become, they are still prone to bogging down unexpectedly.

“One of our big advantages is having contingencies whenever our branches go offline,” Ong narrates. This involves employing mobile phones as alternative transmission gateways whenever systems go down. Branch employees would simply have to send text messages to the system in order to process transactions. Additionally, Ong says, they have developed a text-to-mail service in order to enable e-mail messaging during downtimes.

“Cases of systems going offline and downtimes are rampant especially in the Philippines,” he notes. “Having contingencies in place is important if online processing is critical to your business.”

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By Lucas Mearian
Computerworld (US)
August 18, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Intel today introduced an update to its Atom processor-based platform for home and small business storage appliances.

The updated chip offers a performance boost and supports a new memory technology, Intel said.

The new 1.8GHz D425 (single core) and D525 (dual core) processors are paired with the Intel’s 82801 IR I/O controller that delivers the connectivity. Both new processor platforms support Microsoft Windows Home Server and open source Linux operating systems.

The processors include higher CPU frequencies for faster storage processing and will support next-generation memory technology DDR3 SODIMM. The DDR3 SODIMM dual in-line memory modules offer double the I/O data rates of today’s SDRAM.

In March, Intel announced a new Atom processor platform that was optimized for use in network attached storage (NAS) devices for home and small businesses.

The 1.66GHz Atom D410 single core and D510 dual core processors were bundled with the company’s 82801IR controller to create a hardware platform optimized for processing higher-intensity I/O workloads through hyper-threading, or parallelization of computations, and optimized data handling firmware.

That processing platform increased performance for popular consumer applications such as video processing by as much as 85%.

The new hardware platform supports 6 PCI Express lanes, 12 USB ports, and 2 eSATA ports.

Equipment manufacturers such as Acer, Cisco, LaCie, LG Electronics, NETGEAR, QNAP, Super Micro, Synology and Thecus have all announced plans to offer products based on the new Atom processor platform, Intel said. Storage vendor products featuring the Intel Atom processor-based platform are currently available and additional devices will be released later this year, it added.

LaCie recently introduced two storage servers using Intel’s Atom processor technology to “deliver enterprise-level storage capabilities to small and medium businesses that were previously only experienced in large, corporate environments,” said Erwan Girard, solutions business unit manager.

Dinesh Rao, product line manager for Intel’s Storage Group, said the new Atom processor “makes it possible for storage vendors to develop low-power appliances that can innocuously sit on a desk or shelf while keeping digital content safe and available anytime, anywhere.”

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By Tim Greene
Network World (US)
August 10, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Keeping Microsoft and Cisco in its sights, IBM is planning to introduce variety of collaboration tools for mobile platforms where it wants to create full-featured unified communications endpoints and become the mobile collaboration vendor of choice.

MICROSOFT EXCHANGE IN THE CLOUD: FOUR MIGRATION TIPS

Initially these mobile tools will enable calling features that, for example, determine the least expensive mode for making a phone call, but that will be expanded to include the full range of IBM collaboration and conferencing features, said Alistair Rennie, general manager of IBM Lotus During an interview at IBM’s new and sprawling software development facility in Littleton, Mass. With the most recent release of Lotus SameTime Unified Communications collaboration software last week, the platform now supports Blackberry 5.0 and Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5 clients.

As it accelerates its mobile plans, IBM expects to exploit its already extensive interoperability with other platforms including its major competitor in UC — Microsoft. Its mobile support will also challenge competitor Avaya and its mobile clients. Over time, as businesses deploy 4G handhelds, IBM will fully support mobile collaboration “on the mobile device of choice” and treat the collaboration features as services, not a stack of available features but an always-available set of tools, Rennie said.

He expects customers will adopt SameTime for mobile devices via its cloud-based collaboration suite LotusLive, starting with a core of instant messaging, presence, Web meetings and some video. That will grow over time to include voice integration with corporate directories as well as full video services.

Rennie also said the company would respond to customer demand for appliances that can be used to more easily bring collaboration tools into their networks, much the same way that they can add security platforms to their networks via IBM security appliances.

IBM is also building a downloadable, browser-based plug-in so anyone can join SameTime conferences even if their machines lack SameTime clients. Later this capability will be deployed from LotusLive clouds so, for example, a bank could call a conference to talk to high-value customers and have them participate with relative ease, said Rob Ingram, IBM senior product manager for UC. The clients are already available for Web conferencing and IM, and the browser-based client for video is scheduled for the first quarter of 2011. After that the company may look into a mobile browser-based client as well, he said.

Meanwhile, the company is working with videoconferencing vendors to build adapters to communicate with IBM video infrastructure so, for example, IBM desktop video participants could join conferences anchored by Polycom videoconferencing gear, he said. The user case they’re working on is collaboration with business partners who might not have IBM videoconferencing infrastructure, Ingram said. The list of those participating includes Cisco and Polycom but not Cisco’s Tandberg gear or HP conferencing.

Even as he looks ahead to mobile collaboration, Rennie noted that businesses over the past 18 months have altered their view of UC, which blends presence and various modalities of real-time communication — IM, phone calls, video — with collaboration tools integrated with calendaring and corporate directories, and non-real-time communication such as texting and e-mail. Elements of IBM’s UC offerings include Notes/Domino for messaging and calendaring; Lotus Connections for social collaboration; Lotus Quickr for team collaboration; SameTime for Unified Telephony; Lotus Live for on-premise or cloud collaboration. Avaya, Cisco Microsoft, Siemens and others rank among major competitors.

Whereas customers may have regarded UC as a package of tools that could be bought and installed, they now look at specific business processes, such as order fulfillment, from a desktop perspective rather than as a back-end resource, Rennie said. UC might have been deployed before for a siloed purpose such as a tool for contact-center agents, but now businesses see it with wider applications, he said.

CFOs, for instance can see the cost-saving benefits of enabling a business-analytics dashboard that pushes through work to the next stage by notifying the right person to handle it and pulling together conferences when needed. “We call it collaboration-enabled business processes,” Rennie said.

Such an idea is in contrast to just promoting attractive UC features, such as finding people in a directory with appropriate skills for a task and whose presence information shows they are available in the right modality and then clicking on their name to reach them. That is the way IBM has been selling UC in the past, and that needed to change, says Don Van Doren, a principal with Unicomm Consulting.

“You can use the quick-to-communicate stuff,” Van Doren says. “It’s useful, but it doesn’t touch the central concepts of unified communications and impact how companies can function differently. You need to get to the business guys and say there’s a business-process bottleneck that costs them two days out of every business development cycle.” And then show how UC can remove the bottleneck. But the task is daunting because that means pulling in top executives and line-of-business managers to help make the technology decisions with the IT staff, Van Doren says.

Even with that challenge, IBM is aligned to do well in battling its primary competitor, Microsoft, he says. Other UC vendors such as Cisco and Avaya come from the telephony end of communications, and he feels that software vendors with control of desktop software have the edge. One of IBM’s strengths is that it already has desktop productivity software widely deployed in corporate networks where users are comfortable with it. And it is interoperable with Microsoft platforms, he says, making it possible to use products they have already bought. Specifically, IBM’s strategy to enable putting IBM SameTime presence inside Microsoft’s Outlook and SharePoint, making it attractive to businesses that have already invested in the Microsoft technologies, he says.

Van Doren also ranks IBM as being far ahead in its social networking software for business with Lotus Connections tied into presence and with its capabilities for mining information within the corporate network to enhance finding the right people for specific tasks. “They’ve been working on this four or five years,” he says. “Cisco is just starting to do it.”

IBM also seems to be opening up its platforms more to third-party developers, he says. UC needs ecosystems that independent developers can work in, and Van Doren thinks IBM may be getting to that point. Earlier, the company seemed to want to make releases rock solid before opening up to partners, but it may serve the company better to be more open to third-party developers sooner. “It’s a much better strategy to get [products] out there with more people finding things that need to be fixed. The winner will be the company that opens up and supports best their ecosystem.”

Has IBM turned a corner? “Man, I hope so. We need another strong player in this industry,” Van Doren says.

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by Reynaldo R. Vicente
Computerworld Philippines
August 2, 2010

IT professionals have enough reasons to feel anxious about their careers. Most of them receive lower salaries and although raises were accorded them, the increases were hardly felt. Jobrelated stress has been on the rise in the IT department as workloads have become heavier to heighten production.

However, it’s not all doom and gloom as majority of them expect to get a salary increase this year. And as the level of job performance in the organization improves, job satisfaction becomes stable.

These are some of the highlights of the IS Salary, Job Satisfaction and Career survey conducted by the Computerworld Philippines Research Group from March to May 2010.

LOW SALARY FOR MORE WORK

Salaries for IS positions are still not competitive despite the increasing demand for IS professionals. In fact, a little more than half of respondents reported they were receiving take home pay that is below industry standard.

On the other hand, 43% were happy enough, receiving pay checks that are within the industry average, while six percent claimed their monthly compensations are higher than industry standard.

Majority of respondents described pay hikes as below average to average with six out of 10 getting salary increases ranging from five percent to 10% every year. Thirty-two percent were receiving an average lower than five percent in salary increments; while seven percent were granted increases averaging 11% to 15%. But even with these modest pay rate hikes, these professionals can still adequately cope with the continuing increase in the prices of goods and services. Measured through the consumer price index, the inflation rate reached an average of four percent in the first months of the year, still below the five percent lowest salary increase reported.

Admitting that his monthly take home pay is lower than industry standard and, at the same time, receiving a below average compensation raise, Juanito Macabanti III, a network administrator of the Central Colleges of the Philippines, declares he “will stick it out with the company,” but may study and reconsider appealing offers from other entities if opportunity knocks.

“Probably, the primary reason why I am sticking it out with the company is the security of tenure,” he said, concluding that “although the annual increase in salary is below average, I am assured of my benefits being a regular employee which are not being enjoyed by contractual personnel.”

Macabanti added that if given the opportunity to be offered with attractive remunerations and benefits from other firms, he may reconsider it as long as there will be a security of tenure.

A fatter pay check is not the lone element which satisfies workers although they are also on the lookout for entities that offer more tempting salary packages. In fact, majority of the respondents yearn to be paid salaries that are higher than what they are currently getting. They expect to receive remunerations of 10% to 100% more for the same position they currently hold if they were with another establishments.

On the lighter side, whether these professionals are receiving pallid or substantial salary raises, 65% of them expect to get a pay hike this year despite a constantly changing business environment brought about by economic and political challenges. They are also satisfied with the company benefits that, in one way or the other, boost their compensation packages.

Though granting bonuses and other incentives is generally management’s prerogative, 36% said they are given benefits in the form of profit sharing; 26% announced that they received team performance bonus; while 20% claimed they were provided with anniversary bonuses. Thirteen percent of the respondents were given Christmas bonuses, 14th month pay and other yearend bonuses while eight percent were granted bonuses for completion of a major project.

More than one-fourth of the respondents consider the annual performance of an individual as the biggest factor that determines if an organization will implement salary hikes for its employees. They believe that individual accomplishments should be given more weight in evaluating the performance of employees. This also serves as a basis for granting increases in salaries, or bonuses/honorariums, in some instances.

“We have standardized annual merit increase policy in our company which basically says the rate of the salary increase will be based on the final rating of the performance evaluation,” said Ronilo Quiat, IT manager of Ortigas & Company Limited.

Explaining that they have a matrix on this policy to follow, Quiat declared, “We can not give an increase that goes beyond the corresponding rate specified in that matrix.”

As claimed by 29% of respondents, salary increases are granted only to employees if a company is earning profits. Thus, a company’s annual financial performance also plays an essential role in management’s decision to provide pay hikes to deserving personnel.

For 44% of IT officers surveyed, the budget of the company for IT (including personnel costs) is the most important element that affects the salaries of IT workers in the work place.

“In our company, we look at the budget first, employees’ performance comes next and then the industry standard,” divulged Henry Parcon, chief IT officer of Airlift Asia, Inc. “Sometimes these three will be interpolated based on the risks that we’re about to face,” he added.

CAREER MOTIVATORS

When asked about the three biggest career motivators, aside from money, learning new skills came on top as claimed by 47% of respondents; satisfaction of helping the company run efficiently, which was the choice of 43%, came in second; while job security took the third slot, with 40% voting on it.

Asked if these factors motivate them, Parcon agreed, saying “we build a culture that we have to deliver first what is due to the company and the rest will follow. Learning new skills will come once we have new projects at hand or when we need to upgrade our skills on new technologies. Job security is very important that’s why I always remind my team to be always ready for any eventualities.”

“Being trusted and given the chance to manage the company’s network are great motivating factors,” comments Macabanti. He also considers job security as another motivating factor in a sense that one can enjoy all the benefits of a regular employee and do not have to entertain thoughts that maybe when the contract expires, he will lose his job.

For Quiat, “an efficient operation would have a major impact in the company’s bottom line.” “If there’s an increase in the bottom line, it means we are growing the company and increasing the shareholders’ value as well,” he added.

Regarding learning new skills, Quiat remarked that it is non-negotiable especially in his profession where technologies are changing so fast that he has to catch up. “Of course, I can’t learn everything, so I only choose those technologies that have potential use in our company,” he said.

Admitting that his desire to learn is not limited to technology only, Quiat said that “I also pay attention in improving my skills in leadership, management style, and the like.” These, he noted, can be applied to improve the business processes and decision-making in the organization.

Among the factors that will make IT professionals enjoy their jobs even better, the survey revealed higher pay as the most important; followed by access to new technologies; while bonuses came third. Other notable factors include variety and interesting work; job security, promotions, and autonomy at work.

IT professionals also identified information security, project management, Web development, network security, and Cisco training as some of the skills they need to further their careers.

SHIFT TO NON-IT CAREER

While majority of respondents pursued a career in IT, 18% reported they have plans of shifting to a non-IS career, preferably in the field of business administration. On the other hand, 65% of professionals divulged that they were contacted by a headhunter who enticed them away from their current employers through flexible packages because of their specialized expertise.

Better offer from another company was the top reason for an IS professional to leave his current job, according to 74% of respondents. For 43%, they attributed job turnover to professional development while 40% blamed it to the advancement to higher management role. Other notable factors that drive respondents to move from one firm to another were as follows: low pay, downsizing, job-related issues and due to non-management advancement.

SATISFIED

Meanwhile, despite increasing work loads and mounting level of stress, the vast majority of IT professionals were satisfied at work with eight out of 10 being either very satisfied or somewhat satisfied with their current jobs. In contrast, fourteen percent were not satisfied with their current jobs.

In all levels of IS department, job performance was improving, claimed 56% of respondents. It was stable for 39% while five percent said it was declining. On the other hand, the level of job satisfaction in the IS departments of 50% of the respondents was stable. While it was improving for 40%, the job satisfaction for 10% was declining.

According to 41% of professionals, the key factors that contributed to increased satisfaction were the exposure to new technologies/challenges and the good relationship with management. Promotions/pay increase and increased authority/freedom in decision making also help improve job satisfaction. On the other hand, change in management, work overload/no recognition, and understaffed/downsizing contributed to the decline in satisfaction.

Job satisfaction is more important for more than half of the respondents as against 47% who aim for career advancement. For Macabanti who prefers career advancement over job satisfaction had this to say: “As professionals, we always look at the future. If you are aiming for something, you have to work for it, polish your skills, acquire more and new knowledge, gain the respect of your co-workers and boss, and hopefully get that needed promotion and have the opportunity to manage people.”

“If you are just contented with your daily routine, you will no longer aspire for career advancement, you will not aspire for promotions. You will just be contented with what you currently have, be it knowledge, skills, or monetary remunerations,” he added.

Parcon, who favors job satisfaction’ commented, “On the level where I am now, I will choose job satisfaction as long as I am satisfied with my compensation package. In my age (early 40s), I need to stabilize everything around me. Moving from one position to another will distort projections and targets.”

Noting that job satisfaction is more important to him, Quiat said, “If I am satisfied with what I am doing, I will be able to perform better and deliver what is expected from me. This, in return, will eventually lead into career advancement.”

GENDER GAP

A gender gap, where male IT professionals get paid more than women IT workers for comparable jobs, still exists in 27% of companies-respondents. Women IT personnel in these firms remain underpaid compared to their male counterpart. On the other hand, five percent of respondents said they do not hire female IT professionals.

A vast majority or 68% confirmed that men and women workers with the same jobs were treated and paid equally in their worksites. There is no pay discrepancy whatsoever as the merit-based system they use in evaluating the performance of their employees is the same for both male and female personnel.

Implying that there is no discrimination in their workplace, Parcon noted, “In our company, we treat everyone equally. We merit employees according to performance, job functions, responsibilities, tenure and experiences.”

As he renounced gender gap in their office, Macabanti said, “All employees are treated equal with the same measurement of evaluation and were paid the same for comparable jobs.”

EXPANDING JOB RESPONSIBILITIES

Having clearly defined job descriptions is not the trend for IS officers nowadays. What they are currently experiencing is the expansion in their job descriptions and the growing list of responsibilities they have to implement.

The survey revealed that 40% of IS managers said their jobs have become business oriented; 31% reported that their jobs have become more technical; while 28% confessed their jobs become more crossfunctional.

Due to the growing workloads, IS officers beefed up their efforts to keep up with the old responsibilities while spending time to learn new obligations. Parcon, who said that his job has become business-oriented, stresses that management position is always on the business side. But, as an IT chief officer, he also updates himself about technical details to a certain level. “This keeps me informed while gaining sound decision in technical matters,” he said.

Parcon also relates that the significant change they are experiencing right now is that more and more customers are passing more burdens to their suppliers. “A lot of tasks, reports, and prevalidation were tasked to us to satisfy them.” he discloses.

For Macabanti, time management and work delegation are the answer to additional work load. Although he clarifies that there was no corresponding salary increase for more assignments, “honorariums are sometimes given.” He also said that he attends trainings to cope with added responsibilities.

Quiat, for his part, attended formal courses in business management to cope with his work, especially now that he is handling the administration of the day-to-day operation of their company. “I had a certificate in Real Estate Management in 2004 and completed my MBA (Masters in Business Administration) in 2007. Just recently, I finished a 12-month course – Strategic Business Economic Program and plan to pursue my Masters degree in Business Economics which I believe will help me in handling the non-IT assignments in the company.”

INCREASED STRESS LEVEL

Meanwhile, more IS professionals are struggling with more work and job-related stress. While 34% felt that the level of stress in their organization is at the same level as that of the previous year, 56% say stress level in their worksites is increasing. Yet, they have to work to their fullest potential.

“Stress is very high,” according to Parcon, “but we battle it with collaboration, sharing of experiences, and team bonding.”

A mere 10% reported that stress in their department was lessened.

IT CERTIFICATION

Although certification demonstrates an area of expertise, and can increase an applicant’s chances of employment, it is not required for most IS positions, as seven out of 10 respondents say IT certifications are either not so important or not important at all.

The survey also disclosed that IT certification is not just about money or greater pay as 68% revealed that certified IT personnel in their organization do not receive higher remunerations compared with those who don’t possess certifications.

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By Ross O. Storey
MIS Asia
July 28, 2010

SINGAPORE - Enterprise IT professionals have been urged to “act immediately to put effective security practices into place” in order to protect their companies’ reputation and maintain a competitive edge.

New research, by networking giant Cisco, has concluded that major forces are changing the enterprise security landscape. The ‘Cisco 2010 Midyear Security Report’ states: “Social networking, virtualisation, cloud computing and a heavy reliance on mobile devices continue to have a dramatic impact on the ability of information technology departments to maintain effective network security”.

The research has found that social networks remain a playground for cyber criminals, with an increasing number of attacks.

“New threats are now emerging from a more dangerous criminal element: terrorists,” the Cisco report states. “Indeed, the US government is concerned enough that they have awarded grants to examine how social networks and other technologies can be used to organise, coordinate, and incite potential attacks.

‘SPAMALANCHE’

Other notable findings from the research include:

• Despite recent disruptions to criminal spam operations, in 2010 the worldwide volume of spam is expected to grow by as much as 30 per cent over 2009 levels;

• The United States is once again the country where the largest amount of spam originates, pushing Brazil to third place. India currently ranks second, and Russia and South Korea round out the top five;

• Fifty per cent of end-users admitted they ignore company policies prohibiting the use of social media tools at least once a week, and 27 per cent said they change the settings on corporate devices to access prohibited applications.

Cisco vice president and chief security officer, John N. Stewart, said technological innovations are fundamentally changing the way people live, work, play, share information and communicate with each other.

“Because consumers are typically the early adopters, enterprises often struggle to adapt existing polices to address their employees’ preferred use of technology,” Stewart said.

“With a number of tectonic forces converging in the marketplace, now is the time for enterprises to transform their IT model to accommodate the emerging borderless network and increasing security challenges.”

WHAT TO DO?

Cisco recommends that, to help manage these converging trends, enterprises should:

– Enforce granular per-user policies for access to applications and data on virtualised systems;

– Set strict limits for access to business data;

– Create a formal corporate policy for mobility;

– Invest in tools to manage and monitor cloud activities, and;

– Provide employees with guidance on the use of social media in the workplace.

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By Anuradha Shukla
MIS Asia
July 9, 2010

SHANGHAI - Young dancers in Shanghai and New York are preparing for a National Dance Institute production by leveraging Cisco TelePresence.

National Dance Institute is a not-for-profit organisation that uses arts to engage children and motivate them towards excellence. The performers are using the technology to prepare for the production before they meet face-to-face.

SMART CONNECTED LIFE

For the rehearsal, the dancers from Shanghai Children’s Palace and the choreography team leveraged the Cisco TelePresence suite in the Cisco Pavilion at the World Expo 2010 in Shanghai. On the other hand, the NDI dancers were in the Cisco TelePresence suite in Cisco’s office in New York.

The performance is called ‘The Red Thread’, and is choreographed by Dou Dou Huang, the popular dancer and choreographer from Zhejiang province in China, and Ellen Weinstein, the NDI’s artistic director. The dancers will perform in New York and Connecticut this month once they are ready.

Anthony Elvey, Pavilion director, Cisco, noted that while the National Dance Institute is using dance to bring diverse cultures together, Cisco is utilising technology to bridge time, geographic and cultural distances.

Cisco TelePresence technology is enabling Cisco to elevate creativity and collaboration to the next level, according to Elvey who added that the company is also changing the way people communicate and learn.

JOINING ART AND TECHNOLOGY

This month, the Shanghai dancers will participate in NDI’s Irene Diamond Summer Institute. Using Cisco TelePresence technology, the dancers and choreographers from Shanghai will also teach elements of Chinese folk dancing to NDI students in New York.

The technology will eventually result in a series of performances by the Shanghai and New York dancers.

“Both the arts and technology open people’s hearts and minds to limitless possibilities,” said Jacques d’Amboise, the legendary dancer and founder of NDI. “Dance is basically a form of expression. The way we move and the timing of the movement are how we express ourselves, and Cisco TelePresence can help ensure that none of this expression is lost. With Cisco’s help, these dancers are able to transcend physical distance to be simultaneously moved by the same beautiful piece of music and elegant movements.”

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By John Mark V. Tuazon
Computerworld Philippines
July 8, 2010

IT solutions vendor Hewlett Packard’s acquisition of networking equipment vendor 3Com late last year completes its lineup of networking solutions for the data center, further heating up the battle with industry leader Cisco on the networking front.

Among other segments of networking, 3Com brings to HP’s table a whole suite of solutions targeted at the core networking space, particularly in core routing, aggregation, campus core, and enterprise core solutions.

Core networking products used to be HP’s blind spot, as the IT giant did not have any sort of offering particularly targeted at the space, making fierce competitor Cisco inch ahead of the pack.

But with 3Com adding to the whole networking portfolio of HP, the vendor’s network portfolio has been ramped up to include a whole line of core networking equipment, solutions for the data center, as well as security and management tools.

HP said its upgraded network offering will surely give Cisco a run for their money, especially because their offerings operate on the principles of open systems and interoperability.

HP likewise announced during the launch the release of their new generation ProLiant industry-grade servers, which can deliver 23:1 server consolidation ratio in one box.

The IT giant’s announcement comes at the peak of its “Converged Infrastructure” campaign, an initiative focusing on melding resources into virtual pools so that they are fully utilized, saving firms costs and delivering added efficiencies.

Anthony Agustin, HP’s enterprise server and storage group manager, said most companies today funnel 70% of their IT funds toward keeping the lights on, with very little left for innovation.

“Most firms are suffering from innovation gridlock,” he said. “A lot of companies are managing silos of equipment that are old and very expensive to maintain.

Agustin said HP’s converged infrastructure strategy works because it allows for different systems to be managed under a single management pane across the board. “The data center of the future will surely be built on a converged infrastructure,” he claimed.

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Cisco and Greenfield Development Corp. recently announced their plan to collaborate on building connected communities by integrating smart building and Internet technologies within Twin Oaks Place, the Greenfield District along Shaw Boulevard.

Twin Oaks Place is the first future-ready residential tower in the Philippines and is a project set to reinvent the face of urban landscape and redefine cosmopolitan living in the 21st century.

As part of its Smart+Connected Communities initiative towards helping build social, economic and environmentally sustainable cities of the future, this collaboration represents the first Cisco Smart+Connected Real Estate engagement in the Philippines and will include a future-ready Internet Protocol based building infrastructure making it a flagship “Connected Home” project in Philippines.

This follows previously announced plans by Greenfield Development Corp. to incorporate fiber-optic technology into its upcoming real estate projects, which will provide high-speed Internet access to residential and commercial units within the 10.5-hectare Greenfield District in Mandaluyong City.

Cisco’s Smart+Connected Communities is a global initiative using the network as the platform for integrated city management, better quality of life for citizens, and economic development. Through the Smart+Connected Communities initiative, Cisco believes that the network can be the platform for transforming communities, cities and countries and drive overall sustainability – economic, social and environmental. Bringing together a broad portfolio of products, services, partners and solutions across Cisco, the initiative is focused on intelligent, sustainable solutions for public safety and security, transportation, buildings, utilities, healthcare and education.

Photo shows (from left): Miguel Alava, Cisco Sales Director for Services; Christian Hentschel, Cisco Managing Director of Emerging Countries; Stephen Misa, Cisco Philippines Country Manager; Lisette Mangonon, Sales Director at Diversified Technology Solutions International (DTSI) Inc; Jeffrey Campos, Greenfield Chairman; and Duane Santos, Greenfield General Manager and Executive Vice President.

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By Matt Hamblen
Computerworld (US)
July 1, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - LAS VEGAS — The Cisco Cius tablet introduced on Tuesday is many things, including a business videoconferencing tool. But top Cisco executives declared openly this week that it’s not a competitor to Apple’s iPad.

Most imortant, Cius is yet another physical representation of how far Cisco’s technology can reach.

The traditional routing and switching vendor launched more than 400 products last year, ranging from from large servers to power data centers to new versions of the Flip handheld videocamera.

CEO John Chambers told some 20,000 virtual and physical attendees at Cisco Live! here this week that Cisco’s annual R&D budget currenty stands at $5.2 billion, or about 13% of total revenue. Many technology vendors are pressed to exceed 10% in R&D spending, he noted.

“We are going where no company has gone before,” Chambers said in comments to a group of 12 reporters. “I don’t think any technology company in history has played across this broad array of products.”

He admitted, however, that because of the diversity Cisco hardware, software and ASIC products, the company’s brand has become somewhat obscure and hard to pin down. When asked, Chambers said Cisco has evolved from a “network plumber” to an “innovator.”

Cius could extend the concerns that Cisco is spreading its business too far.

The name alone annoyed some analysts who wondered how Cisco could possibly have derived it. It turns out that the name is a play on the first two letters in “Cisco” combined with “us” as in “See Us,” a reference to Cisco’s emphasis on videoconferencing technology, said Barry O’Sullivan, Cisco’s senior vice president of voice technology, who oversaw development of the device over the past 18 months. Cius was also an ancient city in Greece, O’Sullivan noted.

Chambers was careful to note that the Cius concept falls into Cisco’s plan launched a decade ago to combine voice and data communications on networks over a common Internet Protocol architecture. “If a picture is worth a thousand words, then video is worth a million words,” Chambers said in describing the video network sharing capabilities at the heart of the Cius, and much of the future of Cisco.

It remains unclear whether the new Cisco tablet, aimed initially at enterprise users, can eventually become with a consumer product. “That hasn’t been a point of focus,” Chambers said.

In a related vein, Chambers emphatically told reporters that Cisco has no plans to build a smartphone, indicating that there is a limit to the broad range of technologies that Cisco will produce. “No, it’s very unlikely,” Chambers said about possibly building a smartphone.

Cisco instead wants to focus on interoperability with other products, Chambers said. “We want every industry standard to interface,” he said. “We just want interoperability. We come out of the Internet and that means interoperability. We think in terms of openness.”

When asked about comparisons of Cius to the iPad, Chambers was clear. “Cius is all about collaboration and telepresence,” he said. “It’s a business tablet. I use the iPad and love it. I love anything that loves networks. We do a lot with Apple and they are a great customer and good partner. I think of Cius as a business tablet, so [Cius and iPad] are complementary products with different target markets.”

Several analysts agreed.

“I don’t think it’s a direct consumer product competitor to the iPad and that’s a good thing for Cisco,” said Carl Howe, an analyst at Yankee Group. “If Cius were to compete directly with iPad, Cisco’s version 1 product would be competing against the version 2 iPad due next year. As strong as Cisco may be with businesses, I doubt Cisco would have the market power to succeed against Apple with consumers.”

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By Lucas Mearian
Computerworld (US)
June 11, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco Systems today announced the launch of Cisco Smart Storage , its first line of networked-attached desktop storage devices aimed at businesses with fewer than 100 employees.

Ray Boggs, an analyst with market research firm IDC, said Cisco’s entry into the storage device market is part of a larger industry trend of networking or data center companies attempting to be all things to their customers.

Cisco’s NSS 300 Series of networked storage devices

“Netgear has gone down that road already, as has HP , where you have a network communications company getting involved in storage,” he said. “It speaks to the blurring of a lot of this technology where storage is associated with security, which is associated with the Internet, which then gets you into networking.”

Boggs said Cisco may see larger storage systems as “an interesting prospect,” but he doubted the company would make a move into the SMB or enterprise business space, as that market would bring it into direct competition with business partners and industry stalwarts such as EMC , NetApp, Hewlett-Packard and Dell .

Cisco’s new Small Business NSS 300 Series Smart Storage series consist of two-bay, four-bay and six-bay desktop network storage boxes with up to 12TB of capacity based on 2TB SATA drives.

The arrays, which can be configured as network-attached storage (NAS) or as iSCSI target devices, have retail prices ranging from $913 to $5,625 depending on the capacity and functionality. Cisco also announced an accompanying service plan, the Cisco Small Business Pro Service , which sells for $149 for most NSS 300 Series configurations. The service comes with three years of technical support that includes software updates, 24-hour online chat support, next business-day hardware replacement as necessary, and call support during local business hours.

“The addition of these new devices further emphasizes Cisco’s commitment to providing small businesses with affordable, easy-to-use technology they require to optimize productivity and drive growth,” Ian Pennell, co-chairman of Cisco’s Small Business Council, said in a statement.

The NSS 300 Series Smart Storage supports file sharing and backup for Windows, Mac, and Linux platforms and can be set up in a variety of RAID configurations including RAID 0, 1, 5, and 6 (dual-disk drive failure resiliency). Drives in the storage arrays are also hot-swappable, meaning they can be changed out without disruption.

The hard drives for the NSS 300 Series also come with native encryption capability, and data on the drives can be accessed by a secure remote Web interface. The NSS 300 devices can also be set up by policy to shutdown based on scheduled working hours to save on power. Individual hard disk drives can also be set to spin down during periods of inactivity, Cisco said.

The NSS 300 Series devices include several business applications including a user-configurable Web server with an integrated WordPress publishing platform and built-in servers to simplify user authentication and management of the network.

Cisco claims that its new Smart Storage devices can be set up in minutes and are easy to configure and manage with a straightforward browser -based interface.

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By Rick Broida
PC World (US)
June 11, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - Reader Nayana has two PCs on her home network–one running Windows XP, another running Windows 7. Curiously, the Windows 7 system won’t let her access shared folders on the XP system, but it does work the other way around: she can access the Windows 7 folders from the XP machine.

Bleh. Windows networking has been a nightmare for as long as I can remember. Thankfully, Windows 7 solves a lot of the headaches–but only if all your PCs have it. If there’s an XP box in the mix, problems like Nayana’s are all but inevitable.

Much as I’m a fan of DIY fixes, tinkering with Windows’ networking settings (especially XP’s) is so confusing, frustrating, and frequently fruitless, I’m going to suggest a different (and much simpler) solution.

Yep, you guessed it: Cisco’s Network Magic Essentials. Install this fantastic utility on both your PCs and in no time you’ll be swapping files, sharing printers, and so on. Trust me: it’s the path of least resistance.
The software costs $29.99, but there’s a free 7-day trial. If your main goal is simply to migrate files and data from an old machine to a new one, that should be plenty of time.

One word of caution: for reasons I don’t fully understand, Network Magic’s system requirements make no mention of Windows 7. The software is compatible, but I suspect Cisco may have halted or abandoned its development–probably because of Windows 7 networking features like HomeGroup.

In any case, before you spend a lot of time trying to troubleshoot networking settings manually, give Network Magic a try.

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By Sharon Gaudin
Computerworld (US)
June 9, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco Systems is looking to take popular social networking tools and tricks and bend and meld them into a platform that’s focused on business.

It’s a social way of dealing with everyday business, according to Murali Sitaram, vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Enterprise Collaboration Platform. Sitaram is overseeing the development of Cisco Quad , a Web-based collaboration platform for the enterprise designed to pull together Facebook -like update posts, instant messaging, document sharing, video communication, microblogging and communities.

“We’ve borrowed from the Web 2.0 world,” Sitaram said, noting that Cisco has been working on Quad for about three years. “It’s a manifestation of social capabilities.”

Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter have been hot commodities in the online world where people are eager to share pictures of their kids and updates about their vacations and weekend parties. Enterprises, however, have been slow to see Web 2.0 tools as as resource that could help companies improve their business, and not just a way for employees to waste time.

As Cisco tries to get a leg up in the fairly new enterprise collaboration space, it’ll have some competition from the likes of Microsoft’s Sharepoint business collaboration platform and Google ’s upcoming collaboration and communication tool, Wave .

Cisco Quad went into an initial beta test last fall.

“The Cisco approach to bringing social networking into the enterprise is interesting and different in that it’s more than just having an internal Facebook-like mechanism,” said Dan Olds, an analyst with The Gabriel Consulting Group. “Cisco is talking about integrating enterprise applications into the mix to give social networking more business functionality. This could be an attractive selling point to customers.”

Quad could be coming out just as businesses get their heads around enterprise 2.0 applications , that is, using social networking tools for the enterprise, Olds said.

“Companies are fascinated with the potential benefits associated with social networking,” he said. “They want to get their employees engaged on a deeper level and interacting with a wider range of others. Social networking can certainly do this, but most companies are worried about it being too social and not enough business… This is along the lines of something Google is pitching with their Wave platform, but, to me at least, Wave seems to be quite a bit more social than business. Cisco’s product, on the other hand, looks to be geared to support business tasks and make it easier for employees to do their jobs.”

Cisco Quad is set up to meld various tools into one platform. For instance, Quad is designed to let users microblog inside the platform with posts going out to colleagues who follow them. However, Sitaram pointed out that with a click, the in-house microblogs also can be posted on Twitter, the site that made microblogging a household name.

And for companies that don’t want employees posting updates about certain topics outside of company “confines,” they can set up rules in Quad that will limit users’ ability to make outside posts about certain topics or even on certain days, Sitaram added.

Quad also includes a calendaring application, along with integration of voicemail messages, a Facebook-like feed of updates from colleagues that users have “befriended,” workgroup communities, and a place where documents can be stored and made available for collaborative work. The platform also includes live video, recorded video storage, instant messaging and e-mail.

So colleagues can see Sitaram’s updated Facebook-like postings, microbloggings, shared documents, and the communities of employees with whom he is working to get a better sense of who he is and his role within the company. “You have a sense of who I am,” Sitaram said. “You have a sense of my blogs, what I’ve been doing and even my reporting structure. You have a sense here of me.”

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By Jim Duffy
Network World (US)
May 21, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Juniper Networks’ announcement this week of switches and routers designed to flatten and simplify legacy networks is the latest sign that this company has no intention of backing off in the face of ever stiffer data center competition from Cisco, HP and others.

Juniper’s rollout takes aim at Cisco’s Nexus switches and other data center network wares, while setting the stage for Juniper’s Project Stratus, a converged data center fabric unveiled in early 2009 but still another eight to 12 months away from delivery.

Juniper is trying to set itself apart by optimizing its product line around increasing use of virtualization technologies within the most compute- and networking-intensive sites.

“Virtualization levels the network playing field,” says Yankee Group analyst Zeus Kerravala. “The vendor that solves that problem first has a huge upside.”

The challenge for Juniper is that Cisco’s been targeting virtualization from the networking side for several years, while server titans such as HP and IBM — a Juniper partner in Stratus — have been tackling it from the compute side even longer.Meanwhile, Brocade points out that it has been building data center fabrics with partners for years and that Juniper remains vague about how it will support legacy storage networks.

So Juniper needs to deliver sooner rather than later on the bold pronouncements it made this week, last fall at customer site New York Stock Exchange and over a year ago at the Stratus launch.

Early signs are promising. One example: Juniper beat Cisco in landing the NYSE account, a demanding environment in which latency cannot be tolerated when billions of stock market trades are executed daily.

Juniper, well known as the No. 2 vendor behind Cisco of routers to service providers, has been gaining steam in enterprise routers and switches as well. In enterprise routers, Juniper is No. 2 to Cisco, albeit a distant second, with 5% share of the $790 million worldwide market in the fourth quarter of 2009 compared to Cisco’s 83%, according to Dell’Oro Group. HP/3Com was third at 3%.

In Ethernet switches, Juniper has steadily been building market share since entering the business in early 2008. Its share climbed from 0.3% in 2008 to 1.2% in 2009, according to Dell’Oro, allowing Juniper to surpass longtime player Enterasys and Blade Network Technologies, while catching up to Extreme Networks and Huawei. Cisco still has a hold on market leadership though, with about 70% share.

Juniper seeks to make more headway by addressing what it sees as a need for a new network architecture optimized for virtualized data centers — an architecture that increases performance while reducing costs, and facilitates more server-to-server — rather than switch-to-switch — interaction. At the heart of this architecture is a reduction in the layers of networking in the data center, from three layers — access, aggregation and core — to two and then eventually to one, and that’s exactly where Juniper is headed with its Project Stratus. Juniper says that $1 billion of the $4.8 billion spent on data center switching is for aggregation — the layer Juniper seeks to extract.

“The legacy approach can no longer scale to support virtualization,” Juniper CEO Kevin Johnson said during this week’s Webcast announcement. “Fifty percent of the ports are talking to other network ports” vs. enabling server-to-server interaction, he said. “It’s slow.”

“It’s clear to the industry that, because of server virtualization, a new network needs to emerge,” says Cindy Borovick, a data center analyst at IDC. “[Juniper's announcement] is a reaffirmation of that, with proof points.”

Specifically, Juniper this week announced products that can deliver a two-tier data center architecture this year: a 48-port 10G Ethernet top-of-rack switch, a 40-port 10G Ethernet module for the chassis-based EX 8200 core switch and an Ethernet router for interconnecting data centers with ASICs tuned for high-performance support of virtualization, server/storage/network convergence and lossless Ethernet.

ASICs and Junos software in all of the new products are designed to support FibreChannel-over-Ethernet (CoE) for storage/network convergence. Junos will have FCoE-specific hooks in it in the second half of this year, Juniper says.

Juniper says the top-of-rack EX 4500 has one-fifth of the latency and 22% lower cost than Cisco’s Nexus 5000. The EX 4500 is also Converged Enhanced Ethernet (CEE) and Data Center Bridging (DCB) “capable,” and 44% more power efficient than Cisco’s Nexus 5000, Juniper says.

CEE and DCB are emerging technologies and standards for making Ethernet a lossless fabric for the data center, capable of supporting storage traffic — such as FibreChannel — for converged storage and server access.

Juniper also unveiled a 40-port 10G Ethernet line card for its EX 8200 core switch. This will position the 8200 as an end-of-row switch for aggregating multiple 10G links from servers and server switches.

The new router is the MX 80 3D Ethernet edge services router. It incorporates the Trio chipset Juniper unveiled last fall that’s designed to dynamically and simultaneously support more subscribers, services and bandwidth.

The MX 3D is designed for virtual machine mobility between data centers interconnected by Ethernet Virtual Private LAN Services (VPLS). VPLS provides a single Layer 2 domain between these data centers, in effect providing the stitching in a cloud infrastructure.

This will compete with Cisco Overlay Transport Virtualization data center interconnect technology. Juniper also says the new MX 80 3D Ethernet router takes up half the power and space of Cisco’s ASR 1004, while providing an eightfold improvement in performance.

Cisco declined to comment on the Juniper announcement.

But key to flattening the network architecture is Juniper’s Virtual Chassis technology. Currently, Virtual Chassis allows as many as 10 of Juniper’s fixed configuration EX switches to be connected into a virtual switch that supports hundreds of Gigabit Ethernet ports.

Ostensibly, this will alleviate the three-tier architecture requirement for an aggregation layer made up of several modular switches collecting links from switches in the server racks so that fatter and fewer pipes can run north and south into and out of the data center core. Virtual Chassis will be added to the EX 8200 line in the first half of 2011. It is also expected to be available on the EX 4500 in early 2011 and on the MX 80 3D in the second half of 2011.

Coincidentally, the first deliverable from Stratus will be in the first half of 2011. As Virtual Chassis spreads out across more of Juniper’s product line, expect to see more tangible Stratus products and deliverables emerge. Stratus will essentially be a scaled-out Virtual Chassis architecture capable of supporting thousands of servers and flattening the EX and MX architecture to look like a single Ethernet routing switch.

But analysts expect Cisco to counter.

“Our checks suggest Cisco is working on its own Virtual Chassis technology to address Juniper’s marketing edge,” states Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Ittai Kidron in a bulletin on Juniper’s announcement.

On the software and services side, Juniper unveiled four Junos Space applications. They are Virtual Control, Ethernet Design, Security Design and Services Insight.

Virtual Control includes integration with VMware to manage physical and virtual systems from a common orchestration platform; Ethernet Design and Security Design are intended to enable rapid configuration and deployment of data center networks and security policies; and Service Insight is designed to enable proactive detection, diagnosis and resolution of network issues.

Juniper says the new software and Trio ASICs are also designed to support FCoE, a storage encapsulation technology for converging storage-area network and LAN traffic on a single Ethernet infrastructure. Juniper says it will unveil a version of its Junos operating system software for FCoE in the second half of this year.

Juniper also rolled out software for its SRX Series Services Gateways that gives IT managers application and user visibility into traffic behaviors and changing data flows driven by virtualization, Web 2.0 and cloud services deployment. This new AppTrack software will be available later this quarter.

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By John Mark V. Tuazon
Computerworld Philippines
May 4, 2010

Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. recently made its foray into the unified communications (UC) space, with an offering that pools together three major vendors to provide managed UC solutions to the enterprise.

Dubbed “PLDT UNO,” the UC solution, which the company claims is the first of its kind in the country, leverages the combined expertise of Avaya, Cisco, and Alcatel-Lucent to provide “an enterprise UC solution that works seamlessly agnostic of device, network, or location,” according to Nerissa Ramos, first vice president and head of corporate business group, PLDT.

Ed Doctolero, country general manager of Avaya Philippines, said UC adoption in the country is “still nascent,” considering the country’s nature of heavy traffic, occasional typhoons, and political unrest, which affects daily workers.

“Big enterprises are not putting their roadmap around UC, while SMEs are wary because of the cost,” Doctolero explained, adding that UNO hopes to drive UC’s local adoption by providing an ownership model that is easier to adopt.

UNO will provide for customers, among others, an IP Communications platform, a unified messaging capability, various conferencing choices, and managed services, so customers won’t have to “manage the service themselves and [do away with] equipment obsolescence.”

“UC ensures that no call is ever missed,” explained PLDT’s Ramos, who shared that according to an independent study, 56% of employees are unable to contact their co-workers on the first try, and that 93% of missed calls lead to missed deadlines, project postponements, and delayed revenue conversions.

PLDT’s UNO offering has the capability to record messages from missed calls and notify the customer via email, or have incoming e-mail messages read aloud through text-to-speech technology.
“UNO will help firms rationalize communications cost without sacrificing functionality,” Ramos noted. “Most companies today are in a period of replacing their PABX setup, so this will be a good time to implement UC.”

With UNO, Ramos said companies will be able to leverage the three companies’ resources through the UC box, while enjoying stable connectivity through PLDT’s nationwide IP network. “We have invested around P27 billion on the network side, and our wealth of subscribers and users puts us in the best position to offer this solution,” relates Victor Tria, AVP and head of the business solutions arm of PLDT.

Tria shared that PLDT has the network backbone—the IP VPN and the mobile network—to ably provide for the customers’ needs. “Estimated savings are equivalent of the loss of NDD charges, because the calls are coursed through the IP network,” he added.

Users can avail of PLDT UNO services for an estimated cost of P16,000 a month for 24 endpoints, to as much as P120,000 a month for 100 endpoints, the executives said.

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By Ellen Messmer
Network World (US)
April 29, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - In the latest chapter of what it calls its “Secure Borderless Network” initiative, Cisco Wednesday is announcing expanded reporting capability for its ScanSafe Web-filtering service as well as the addition of a data-loss prevention option for the company’s cloud-based e-mail security service.

Cisco launches new servers, switches, SANs to sweep through the data center

Cisco, which acquired ScanSafe in December, says its offering now provides user behavior trends, details on any company policy violations, malware statistics and forensic analysis information. “It shows you how people use your network for Internet [access], which Web sites they’re visiting, which sites you’re blocking,” says Garry Scott, Cisco product marketing manager.

NewPage, a Miamisburg, Ohio, coated-paper manufacturer, uses ScanSafe to control Web usage for thousands of employees and has been testing the new reporting tool for a few months and has seen a dramatic improvement.

“The old version just did basic reports, but the new version allows you to process a year’s worth of data, using at least 87 different attributes, extremely quickly,” says Paul Moorman, information technology strategist at NewPage.

Moorman says NewPage decided to block the vast majority of Web sites in China since it appears that country is an originating point for a very high level of viruses, and at this point there’s no specific business need to have access to most Chinese Web sites. NewPage, which has about 7,000 employees, is gradually moving away from an MPLS-based network to use of Internet pipes. This has proven economical, and Moorman says he expects use of Internet-based hosted services to continue to grow at the firm.

Cisco also announced it’s adding a DLP and encryption capability to its IronPort-based hosted e-mail security service, which customers can use in lieu of installing the IronPort appliance on their own premises.

The DLP service option for the cloud is based on the technology Cisco licenses from RSA and already added to the IronPort appliance last year.

Cisco says the new cloud-service option includes a way to transmit TLS-protected e-mail from the customer’s e-mail server to a Cisco data center — Cisco claims it will have 33 of these data centers globally by year-end — where the e-mail would be filtered to make sure it doesn’t contain sensitive information before re-transmitting it.

Cisco acknowledges it’s competing against Google’s Postini service, which has some basic DLP features.

Moorman says he expects NewPage might try the Cisco e-mail security service with DLP in the future, but noted the his company has a multi-year contract left to run with the Google Postini service, and that his contract with ScanSafe is actually through Postini. Cisco says there are no immediate plans to change the ScanSafe partner arrangements.

Pricing on the ScanSafe service typically runs $2 to $5 per user per month, and the DLP feature in Cisco’s e-mail security service costs between $1.25 to $1.50 per user per month.

Read more about data center in Network World’s Data Center section.

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By Al Sacco
CIO.com
April 27, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Corporate BlackBerry users who spend a good portion of their workweeks on conference calls and participating in online meetings have a cause for celebration today: Cisco has released the free WebEx Meeting Center for BlackBerry application, which lets users quickly and easily join WebEx meetings by clicking on invite URLs in e-mail or BlackBerry calendar entries.

Cisco WebEx Meeting Center for BlackBerry also lets users view shared meeting documents and participant desktops. And menu options within the app provide speedy access to WebEx features and shortcuts for more efficient navigation via smartphone, all using the company’s “Cisco WebEx Collaboration Cloud.”

I haven’t had time to put the app through the paces quite yet, but this sounds like a good one. It should be easy to use; Cisco says you just click on a WebEx meeting URL using your BlackBerry, and the WebEx audio conferencing system should call your device shortly thereafter. When you answer the call, the “data-portion,” or the visual component of your meeting, should launch immediately via BlackBerry.

WebEx meeting hosts can begin previously-scheduled meetings via BlackBerry, and they can also pass on presenter control to other participants using PCs–presumably that means presenters cannot “control” meetings using just a BlackBerry and no computer. And you can use the app to view shared presentations, applications and participant desktops, all with live annotations, Cisco says.

The WebEx BlackBerry app isn’t the first of its kind; Fuze Meeting for BlackBerry offers similar functionality. But it’s designed by Cisco specifically for WebEx, so it will presumably offer a better overall experience–at least for Cisco online meetings.

It’s unclear what BlackBerry devices and/or carriers are supported at this point, but I was able to download and install the app on my T-Mobile BlackBerry Bold 9700 without any issue.

Cisco WebEx Meeting Center for BlackBerry should be available via BlackBerry App World soon, but as of 12 noon EST today, it’s still not listed. For now, you can download the app by simply clicking on a WebEx meeting URL within a BlackBerry e-mail or calendar entry. If your device is supported, you should be prompted to download the app. Or you can download it directly from Cisco via BlackBerry browser at WebEx.com.

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By Robert McMillan
IDG News Service (San Francisco Bureau)
April 20, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - Terry Childs’ battle to avoid being convicted over what his supporters characterize as a workplace dispute that got out of hand is almost over.

Closing arguments concluded Monday in the city of San Francisco’s case against Childs, the network administrator charged with violating California hacking laws by refusing to hand over network passwords for the city’s FiberWAN during a 12-day period in 2008.

Childs was charged in July 2008 and has been held on US$5 million bail ever since. The highly technical trial, which featured testimony from San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and Cisco Chief Security Officer John Stewart, has dragged on for nearly six months.

By Monday, five of the 18 jurors and alternates selected for the trial had dropped out, and the remaining jurors seemed relieved to see the arguments wrap up as they left the courtroom Monday afternoon. They will return Tuesday to start their deliberations.

Childs faces five years in prison if he is convicted for disrupting service to the city’s computer system by withholding administrative passwords.

The case hinges on Childs’ refusal to hand over router passwords to city staffers during a tense confrontation with management, a human resources representative and police officers on July 9, 2008. Three days later he was arrested.

In court Monday, Childs’ attorney, Richard Shikman, argued that his client is a security-conscious professional who simply balked during a stressful situation. Childs did not believe the other people in the room and those who were conferenced in via speakerphone were authorized to have access to the passwords. “This case smacks of an employment dispute that went awry,” Shikman said. “It could have been handled differently.”

Childs was simply doing his job, he argued — an important point for the defense, since under California law Childs cannot be found guilty if the disruption he caused occurred as the result of a good-faith effort to do his job.

San Francisco Assistant District Attorney Conrad Del Rosario portrayed Childs as a self-obsessed man who locked the city out of its own network in the misguided hope that it would make it impossible for the city to fire him. “This was nothing more than his attempt to become an indispensable employee,” Del Rosario said, “You suspend me; the FiberWAN goes down.”

Prosecutors also need to have convinced the jury that San Francisco computer services were disrupted, even though the network continued to operate smoothly while Childs withheld the passwords from Richard Robinson, the chief operations officer for the city’s Department of Technology and Information Services (DTIS). Childs eventually handed over the passwords to San Francisco’s mayor, saying Newsom was the only person qualified to handle them.

The fact that the city was unable to do things such as prevent Childs himself from accessing the network shows that computer services were indeed disrupted, Del Rosario argued Monday.

He also disputed the defense’s argument that Childs was being extremely security conscious and trying to protect the city’s network from a possible insider threat. “It’s the defendant who they needed to protect against,” he said. “They just didn’t know it at the time.”

Whether that is the characterization of Childs that will stick is now a matter for the jury to decide.

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By Stephen Lawson
IDG News Service (San Francisco Bureau)
April 20, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - Cisco Systems closed its acquisition of Tandberg on Monday, formally ending a tense struggle over the fair value of the Norwegian videoconferencing vendor.

Effective Monday, Tandberg’s product line is now part of Cisco’s Telepresence portfolio and former Tandberg CEO Fredrick Halvorsen is senior vice president of a new unit of Cisco, the Telepresence Technology Group. The new group is made up of businesses focusing on telepresence endpoints, back-end infrastructure and Cisco Telepresence cloud services. It is part of Cisco’s Emerging Technologies Group, under the leadership of Cisco Senior Vice President Marthin De Beer.

Cisco has made video a major focus of its business in the past few years, with its Telepresence high-definition videoconferencing products at the front of the lineup. Tandberg, a longtime supplier of various video products for enterprises, fleshes out Cisco’s midrange lineup.

The acquisition was one of Cisco’s most difficult. The company offered US$3 billion for Tandberg last Oct. 1, but that offer did not receive the required support of owners of 90 percent of Tandberg shares. Two investment consulting companies said Cisco had undervalued Tandberg. The dominant networking vendor eventually raised its bid to 19 billion Norwegian kroner, or about $3.4 billion, and extended its offer three times. On Dec. 3, Cisco declared that owners of 91.1 percent of Tandberg’s shares had agreed to the buyout.

Cisco said Monday it had made the acquisition for 19 billion kroner, equivalent to about $3.3 billion at the time the deal closed.

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By Jim Duffy
Network World (US)
April 7, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco this week rolled out a bevy of data center products ranging from servers to switches to SANs, all designed to further broaden the company’s reach beyond networking and into IT infrastructure.

Cisco’s new offerings include blade and rack servers incorporating Intel’s Xeon 7500 processor, and supporting the company’s FEXlink switching fabric extension architecture. Cisco also unveiled two new Nexus fabric extenders supporting speeds above and below Gigabit Ethernet; an 8Gbps fixed configuration MDS FibreChannel SAN switch; and an appliance for provisioning services to virtual machines.

The sum of the parts indicates Cisco’s intention to play in virtually every facet of data center IT – not just the network and not just virtualization, analysts say.

“The targeting is the big news,” says Jonathan Eunice of Illuminata. “Cisco got into the server business with very narrow targeting: [CEO John] Chambers said, we’re not really after the server business, we’re after the virtualization business. This announcement changes that. [Cisco is] going after any workload, virtual or non-virtual. The specificity is gone.”

This means Cisco will compete more directly with data center server incumbents IBM, HP and Dell. But the company is still looking to differentiate itself by targeting “high-value” sales of server complexes instead of single, standalone servers, Eunice says; and Cisco is still stressing overall data center consolidation, virtualization and automation.

“Even though they’re relaxing their targeting, they’re still very much going for the high-value workload and they’re going for the infrastructure-by-the-ton (sale),” Eunice says. “They don’t want to sell you one; they want to sell in volume for a very standardized kind of infrastructure.”

In that vein, Cisco rolled out two new UCS blade and rack servers: the B440 M1 and the C460 M1. Both are based on Intel’s Xeon 7500 processor and both – like the other switching and storage access components of UCS now do – support Cisco’s FEXlink architecture for increased performance, bandwidth and access to other resources in the data center.

FEXlink extends the switching fabric of a data center – the mesh of bandwidth configured from multiple core, end of row and top of rack switches — closer to the servers and server racks themselves. This results in a 4x increase in server bandwidth, or 160Gbps per blade, Cisco says. It also allows the blades to harness 8Gbps uplinks to FibreChannel switches, increasing bandwidth to storage resources by 50%, and support more virtual interfaces per NIC, the company says.

This, combined with the new processors, allow the B440 M1 and C460 M1 to support a fourfold increase in compute capacity, making UCS a more general purpose data center physical workload workhorse – not just one optimized for virtual workloads, analysts say.

The B440 M1 and C460 M1 will be available this summer. Cisco claims to have at least 400 customers to date for the platform, and expects $1 billion in revenue this year. But analysts note that demand seems to be lukewarm and that deployments are still mostly trial – not production.

“I think it’s still in the kicking the tires phase,” Eunice says. “Cisco is not a traditional vendor in the server space. This is really not even through the first full year of shipment. They have not disclosed a long list of massive sale, whereas you go to HP or IBM they have tons of references for any size sale.”

To extend the market appeal of FEXlink, meanwhile, Cisco introduced two new Nexus 2000 fabric extenders scaling above and below the 2148T Gigabit Ethernet version unveiled in January, 2009. The Nexus 2232 supports 32 10Gbps Ethernet ports and can extend the FibreChannel over Ethernet capabilities of the Nexus 5000 switch down to the server rack; the 2248 is a 48-port 10/100Mbps Ethernet configuration of the line. Cisco also unveiled a fabric extender transceiver module intended to lower the per port price points of the fabric extenders – down to about $300 per 10Gbps port, Cisco says.

“It lets you take the Nexus fabric and scale it to as much as you want,” says Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at The Yankee Group. “It’s a good way to get people started (with Nexus switching) at relatively low price/points and extend it without waiting for the (higher-end Nexus) 7000.”

Cisco says it has 2,000 customers and 1 million ports shipped of the Nexus 2000 line. The 2232 and 2248 are both available this quarter at an entry price of $9,000.

For pure FibreChannel deployments, Cisco unveiled the MDS 9148 SAN switch. It supports 48 8Gbps FibreChannel ports in a 1 RU footprint. It is intended as a complement to the existing 8Gbps FibreChannel modules for the chassis-based MDS 9500 SAN switch.

Analysts say the density of the 9148 in that configuration is impressive, but that Cisco is late to the 8Gbps FibreChannel party, which Cisco previously acknowledged.

“Eight gig FibreChannel’s been out there for a while so it’s hard to get too excited about it,” Kerravala says. Users began migrating to 8Gbps FibreChannel in the second half of 2008.

The MDS 9148 will be available from Cisco partners this quarter.

Cisco also rolled a dedicated appliance for provisioning virtual switching service to virtual machines. The Nexus 1010 hosts virtual services, such as the Nexus 1000V virtual switch, to ease installation and bestow “ownership” of virtual services to the network administrator instead of the server administrator. The Nexus 1010 also supports network analysis down to the virtual machine layer.

The Nexus 1010 costs $25,000 and will be available this quarter.

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By Jim Duffy
Network World (US)
April 6, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco this week rolled out a bevy of data center products ranging from servers to switches to SANs, all designed to further broaden the company’s reach beyond networking and into IT infrastructure.

Slideshow: Cisco’s data center deluge
A test of Cisco’s Nexus 5000 data center switch

Cisco’s new offerings include blade and rack servers incorporating Intel’s Xeon 7500 processor, and supporting the company’s FEXlink switching fabric extension architecture. Cisco also unveiled two new Nexus fabric extenders supporting speeds above and below Gigabit Ethernet; an 8Gbps fixed configuration MDS FibreChannel SAN switch; and an appliance for provisioning services to virtual machines.

The sum of the parts indicates Cisco’s intention to play in virtually every facet of data center IT – not just the network and not just virtualization, analysts say.

“The targeting is the big news,” says Jonathan Eunice of Illuminata. “Cisco got into the server business with very narrow targeting: [CEO John] Chambers said, we’re not really after the server business, we’re after the virtualization business. This announcement changes that. [Cisco is] going after any workload, virtual or non-virtual. The specificity is gone.”

This means Cisco will compete more directly with data center server incumbents IBM, HP and Dell. But the company is still looking to differentiate itself by targeting “high-value” sales of server complexes instead of single, standalone servers, Eunice says; and Cisco is still stressing overall data center consolidation, virtualization and automation.

“Even though they’re relaxing their targeting, they’re still very much going for the high-value workload and they’re going for the infrastructure-by-the-ton (sale),” Eunice says. “They don’t want to sell you one; they want to sell in volume for a very standardized kind of infrastructure.”

In that vein, Cisco rolled out two new UCS blade and rack servers:  the B440 M1 and the C460 M1. Both are based on Intel’s Xeon 7500 processor and both – like the other switching and storage access components of UCS now do – support Cisco’s FEXlink architecture for increased performance, bandwidth and access to other resources in the data center.

FEXlink extends the switching fabric of a data center – the mesh of bandwidth configured from multiple core, end of row and top of rack switches — closer to the servers and server racks themselves. This results in a 4x increase in server bandwidth, or 160Gbps per blade, Cisco says. It also allows the blades to harness 8Gbps uplinks to FibreChannel switches, increasing bandwidth to storage resources by 50%, and support more virtual interfaces per NIC, the company says.

This, combined with the new processors, allow the B440 M1 and C460 M1 to support a fourfold increase in compute capacity, making UCS a more general purpose data center physical workload workhorse – not just one optimized for virtual workloads, analysts say.

The B440 M1 and C460 M1 will be available this summer. Cisco claims to have at least 400 customers to date for the platform, and expects $1 billion in revenue this year. But analysts note that demand seems to be lukewarm and that deployments are still mostly trial – not production.

“I think it’s still in the kicking the tires phase,” Eunice says. “Cisco is not a traditional vendor in the server space. This is really not even through the first full year of shipment. They have not disclosed a long list of massive sale, whereas you go to HP or IBM they have tons of references for any size sale.”

To extend the market appeal of FEXlink, meanwhile, Cisco introduced two new Nexus 2000 fabric extenders scaling above and below the 2148T Gigabit Ethernet version unveiled in January, 2009. The Nexus 2232 supports 32 10Gbps Ethernet ports and can extend the FibreChannel over Ethernet capabilities of the Nexus 5000 switch down to the server rack; the 2248 is a 48-port 10/100Mbps Ethernet configuration of the line. Cisco also unveiled a fabric extender transceiver module intended to lower the per port price points of the fabric extenders – down to about $300 per 10Gbps port, Cisco says.

“It lets you take the Nexus fabric and scale it to as much as you want,” says Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at The Yankee Group. “It’s a good way to get people started (with Nexus switching) at relatively low price/points and extend it without waiting for the (higher-end Nexus) 7000.”

Cisco says it has 2,000 customers and 1 million ports shipped of the Nexus 2000 line. The 2232 and 2248 are both available this quarter at an entry price of $9,000.

For pure FibreChannel deployments, Cisco unveiled the MDS 9148 SAN switch. It supports 48 8Gbps FibreChannel ports in a 1 RU footprint. It is intended as a complement to the existing 8Gbps FibreChannel modules for the chassis-based MDS 9500 SAN switch.

Analysts say the density of the 9148 in that configuration is impressive, but that Cisco is late to the 8Gbps FibreChannel party, which Cisco previously acknowledged.

“Eight gig FibreChannel’s been out there for a while so it’s hard to get too excited about it,” Kerravala says.  Users began migrating to 8Gbps FibreChannel in the second half of 2008.

The MDS 9148 will be available from Cisco partners this quarter.

Cisco also rolled a dedicated appliance for provisioning virtual switching service to virtual machines. The Nexus 1010 hosts virtual services, such as the Nexus 1000V virtual switch, to ease installation and bestow “ownership” of virtual services to the network administrator instead of the server administrator. The Nexus 1010 also supports network analysis down to the virtual machine layer.

The Nexus 1010 costs $25,000 and will be available this quarter.

Read more about data center in Network World’s Data Center section.

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By Tom S. Noda
Computerworld Philippines
March 29, 2010

After what it claims to be a successful virtualization mission in 2009, EMC is now focused on advancing its so-called “private cloud” service this year 2010, where it will enable customers to get the best of both worlds when it comes to security, operational control and availability.

Ronnie Latinazo, country manager of EMC Philippines, reported that the VCE Coalition (VMware, Cisco, and EMC), after its virtualization quest among several data centers is now seeing more companies moving into cloud computing.

“We want to bring customers to the private cloud (internal cloud) where we offer flexibility but with no upfront investments,” Latinazo said. “We’ll place ourselves as the infrastructure provider.”

Latinazo added many companies are now in the state of evaluating the idea of cloud computing both on the technological and business standpoint after experiencing server reductions such as five to one server ratio.

The executive described EMC’s business and market performance in 2009 as “healthy” achieving revenue growth of close to 10% year-on-year in the fourth quarter. It likewise grew revenue by more than 60% sequentially over the third quarter of last year.

Quoting a report by IDC, Latinazo said EMC in the Philippines during the fiscal year of 2009 led in terms of entry external storage market at 25.30%; midrange external storage market, 48.36%; and high end external storage market at 48.70%; achieving a total external storage market of 40.28%.

But besides the private cloud, Latinazo said EMC’s other priorities this year will be on external cloud computing (infrastructure and services), virtual desktops and clients, and next-generation backup and recovery. 

Latinazo revealed EMC has become the “No. 1 storage space” in the Philippines last year, describing the country as an exciting growth market focused on best product solutions.

He said EMC plans to take its customers in the Philippines on the journey to the private cloud – sharing the entire EMC portfolio and leveraging EMC as a consulting organization.

However, for EMC’s partners, he said they intend to strengthen the firm’s channel community and empower them to bring more of their information infrastructure solutions to more customers. 

“For EMC’s products, we would be bringing manufacturing capabilities to Asia so that we can better address customers’ requirements in the region,” he said, adding EMC also aims to deliver service quality by leveraging partner and EMC resources to address customers’ pain points.

Latinazo said the VCE coalition represents the collaboration of three industry leaders which focus around development – a unified sales, service and support experience – and partner ecosystem enablement.

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By Anuradha Shukla
MIS Asia
March 26, 2010

SINGAPORE - Cisco introduced the CCIE certification in 1993 to aid the industry in distinguishing the top inter-networking experts worldwide.

Fifteen years later, the company has announced the results of a comprehensive end-customer survey conducted by the international CCIE community. Through this survey, Cisco is trying to gain insight into what digital infrastructures will look like over the next five years.

Perspective of IT professionals

This research was conducted by a strategic research firm Illuminas, and commissioned as part of Cisco’s overall 25th anniversary celebration. The survey was designed in a manner to know the unique perspective of some of the most knowledgeable information technology professionals in the networking industry.

According to Cisco, there are several factors that are driving innovation such as virtualisation, security and risk management, unified communications, video, and real-time collaboration.

The majority (two-thirds) of the CCIE holders surveyed expect virtualisation to be the top networking investment over the next five years. Virtualisation is seen as an energy-, space- and cost-saving measure and the respondents believe that a holistic and comprehensive virtualisation strategy can increase operational efficiency and simplify management.

Avoid security breaches

Cisco emphasises the importance of networking professionals to stay ahead of the increasing number of internal and external security breaches. About 64 per cent of respondents said security and risk management will be the networking skills in greatest demand in the coming three to five years.

About fifty per cent expect more companies to adopt unified communications leading to increased collaboration in the workforce. Thirty per cent of those surveyed expect that over the next five years, CIOs will especially focus on accommodating the needs of a highly collaborative, global workforce.

Real-time video solutions such as Cisco TelePresence will be one of the top green initiatives affecting networks and network engineers, according to 52 per cent of the respondents.

“CCIE holders have established a reputation for leading the networking industry in deep technical networking knowledge and are typically deployed into the most technically challenging network assignments,” said Jeanne Beliveau-Dunn, general manager, Learning@Cisco. “As a result, they have an unparalleled depth of knowledge and experience.”

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By Tim Greene
Network World (US)
March 23, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - At Voicecon’s opening Monday in Orlando, vendors are poised to push unified communications and Microsoft is stepping into the spotlight by announcing alliances with other vendors whose gear interoperates with Microsoft Office Communications Server.

Polycom, HP and NET are expanding relationships with Microsoft in order to better integrate with OCS and the company’s UC products.

Cisco telepresence cuts near $1M in travel costs for law firm

Polycom is expanding its relationship with Microsoft with the announcement of IP conference phones optimized for OCS that will be available by the end of June. HP will resell NET’s UC gateway as a way to support Microsoft UC. The NET VX gear is built specifically to support Microsoft UC.

HP is also announcing the Survivable Branch Communication zl Module for its Procurve Switch 8200zl and 5400zl switches that supports traditional phone network backup for VoIP infrastructure based on Microsoft UC.

Meanwhile, Polycom is announcing a stronger relationship with HP, which will resell all of Polycom’s product line. This follows the severing last month of the reseller agreement the companies had with Cisco, which is buying Polycom rival Tandberg.

During the show, Avaya’s CEO Kevin Kennedy will try to draw a contrast between this type of custom collaboration with Microsoft vs. Avaya’s vision of open Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) implementations. He characterizes SIP implementations by Microsoft and Cisco as closed and unsuited for multivendor environments. The intent of these vendors, he says, is to lock customers in to their products rather than interoperate with other vendors’ gear.

Avaya’s open model will better support innovation because multiple vendors will be able to quickly create applications that can be readily absorbed into an open SIP infrastructure, he says, rather than be customized for a vendor using more restricted protocols. Avaya’s main push over the past year has been to establish its gear as a mediator among SIP platforms regardless of vendor.

Kennedy says that characteristic has served Avaya well because the past year has seen the consolidation of businesses that results in larger entities with diverse communications infrastructure. Avaya gear has enabled some of them to unite their disparate equipment into unified networks, he says.

Also at VoiceCon, Verizon plans to announce a service that links Cisco telepresence customers to each other via a new exchange that also offers concierge services to make scheduling conferences and connecting simpler. The service, called Immersive Video Conferencing Service for Cisco Telepresence, has a start-up fee that includes training and setting up gear so it works properly. All parties to conferences have to be Verizon customers.

Verizon is announcing that its SIP-trunking service is certified by Microsoft as compatible with Microsoft’s Office Communications Server 2007 Revision 2. This means that customers using the service can get Microsoft technical support if they have problems with VoIP connections that run over the network.

Also at the show Sipera plans to announce a version of its Secure Live Communications client for iPhones, making possible to encrypt all traffic to and from the phones. The phones can become VoIP extensions of enterprise voice and data networks without risking corporate information.

Voicecon is the launchpad for a Nortel UC platform for carriers that can be used to provision UC, VoIP and collaboration services for business customers. Called Carrier VoIP and Application Solutions, the platform lets customers move from TDM to IP-based communications without investing in infrastructure of their own.

Read more about lans and routers in Network World’s LANs & Routers section.

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By Jim Duffy
Network World (US)
March 10, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco’s new CRS-3 core router, which the company has boasted will “forever change the Internet,” will come with 100Gbps Ethernet interfaces and 322Tbps multichassis interconnect capability.

The router also will support software to help make data center and cloud computing resources more available to users, and will use 60% less power than its predecessor, the CRS-1, said Mike Capuano, Cisco’s director of service provider marketing, in an interview following Tuesday’s announcement.

Cisco expects to ship the 120G per slot system, which has three times the capacity of the CRS-1, in the third quarter.

Some wonder whether such capacity claims are all that meaningful, however, in that Cisco never really delivered on it 92Tbps promises with the CRS-1. The largest CRS-1 multichassis deployment connects eight CRS-1s into a 10Tbps system, Capuano acknowledges.

So will any carrier really need a 322Tbps system any time soon?

“We’re continuing to increase the size of our multichassis deployments at a pace where we’re meeting customer demand,” Capuano said. “We don’t want to get ahead of them; we have to time it so that we’re delivering the right set of capabilities as time progresses. It’s all designed in from the beginning.”

Capuano also said all CRS-1 modules are forward compatible with the new router.

The CRS-3 delivers the industry’s most energy efficient core router, according to Capuano. It consumes 2.75 watts/gigabit, almost half that of rival Juniper’s 4.4 watts/gigabit on the T1600, he said.

The single port 100G Ethernet interface for the CRS-3 supports “singleflow” 100G transmissions through Cisco’s QuantumFlow Array chipset. It transmits a single 100G flow while other 100G Ethernet interfaces take two 50G forwarding engines and multiplex traffic across them, Capuano said.

“That makes it much harder to do a multichassis design,” he said.

For delivery of data center and cloud services, the CRS-3 supports Cisco software called Data Center Services System. The software detects changes in traffic patterns of workloads between data centers and locates the best path to access compute and storage resources, or content. It works with another attribute of the Data Center Services System software called Cloud VPNs to set up a secure MPLS connection between data centers to balance workloads.

“That’s a big part of this next generation Internet — the emergence of cloud,” Capuano said. “It requires scale, savings and service intelligence.”

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By Tom S. Noda
Published in the CWP February 2010 issue

With IT now becoming relevant to the business and its products, CIO and IT administrators today are increasingly under pressure to run the IT department as a profit center. But to turn the IT center into a money-making machine, CIOs will need technology itself to help them make a 180-degree turnaround in the way their IT organizations function.

During the 2009 yearend Computerworld Philippines CIO Forum held in December, vendors Avaya, Emerson and EMC, share strategies and tactics on how IT managers can achieve an IT department that not only saves on cost but can also contribute to business earnings.

For Jojo Abudancia, regional solutions manager of Avaya Philippines, an IT department can serve as a profit center by attracting and retaining customers using new business communications technologies. And some of the results, he notes, would be to reduce infrastructure costs, delivery of business agility and the securing of loyal customers.

“You must use communications instead of communications using you,” Abudancia says, adding Avaya has now come up with solutions designed for open, flexible reference architecture for cost-effective and agile communications that allow business users to serve customers better.

Abudancia introduced the new Avaya Aura, a suite of applications having an open SIP (session initiation protocol) at its core. And this SIP called Session Manager is not limited to Avaya’s infrastructure alone.

“Since this SIP is an open standard, we can use other brands, like Cisco or Nortel. In some cases, we can actually integrate even lower technologies like old versions of Avaya,” he explains. “The advantage is we now have a chance to integrate all of them and have a seamless enterprise experience. We can connect these technologies into the SIP cloud based on the Session Manager and make them have a single dial plan.”

Abudancia adds users can also have shared application on top of the SIP cloud such as voice mail or conferencing, IVR systems, and that customized applications can be made available throughout the enterprise.

“If you’re using different technologies like Cisco, Nortel, Avaya, chances are they have different voice mails. If you will integrate that into one and having that voicemail server on top of the cloud, then you reduce the number of systems that you manage and make it available for the whole enterprise. And once you have that consolidated network then customer experience is going to be much better because you are using the same application throughout the network,” Abudancia explains.

Meanwhile, Russel Perry, director for marketing of Emerson Network Power in Asia- Pacific, talked about preparing one’s IT infrastructure for virtualization or understanding from start and finish the criteria role of the data center.

Perry says the ability to virtualize is limited by one’s technology environment and Emerson can help by making an IT group understand clearly the infrastructure objectives and get involved with a high density computing environment.

“Virtualization alone really requires a framework. So what we will do is to provide you with a framework within which virtualization can fit. The benefit is you can then enable efficiency and lower operation cost in terms of CAPEX. The framework we’re talking about is to look at the total operational cost,” Perry says.

Perry says that among the issues to consider in order to determine if one’s department is ready for virtualization are: capacity and availability planning; power issues such as usage of a centralized UPS system or multiple small UPS; cooling systems; monitoring management; and after sales support.

Perry announces Emerson will have a suite of new product releases by early this year which will involve cooling, optimization, energy cooling for high density, and power distribution.

Meanwhile, Ronald De Guzman, senior technology consultant of RSA – the security division of EMC, discusses securing information in order to secure profit.

De Guzman stresses that CIOs should have a systematic approach to security and must make it information-centric, which is focused on managing information risk.

“In implementing a security initiative, it doesn’t always have to be a big bang or shotgun approach. It should be focused on the risk,” De Guzman relates.

He shares four steps to take when it comes to information risk management: define the policy (classification and control policy); discover/detect; implement and enforce; and monitor and report.

De Guzman says that the number one assignment is to find out where the sensitive information is and to classify it. The creation of security policy then follows wherein one can now implement the controls.

“It’s not like you come in and implement the security policy blindly. You cannot secure what you do not know and you can’t secure if you don’t know where they are,” De Guzman says. “So it involves these processes, policy creation, discovery and classification. Afterwards, the implementation for control follows and you should be able to allow yourself to monitor and audit what you have done.”

And in securing information infrastructure, De Guzman says that an IT department should ensure that the right people have access to the right information over a trusted infrastructure.

“The strategy is actually a repeatable process. Overtime you will acquire new things like applications and that would change the landscape again. So you should try to, in a much smaller scale, do the whole process again. Security is a journey, and it’s a continuous process,” De Guzman emphasizes.

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By Jon Brodkin
Network World (US)
February 25, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco and several other investors have given $10.5 million to HyTrust, a start-up that is tackling some of the thornier security problems posed by the growing popularity of VMware’s virtualization platform.

Virtualization security remains a work in progress

HyTrust won “Best of Show” at last year’s VMworld, the major virtualization conference hosted by VMware, and was named of Network World’s 10 start-ups to watch in 2010.

When HyTrust launched its first product last April it already had $5.5 million in venture capital from Trident Capital and Epic Ventures. Now the company has added a second round of financing with the existing investors as well as Cisco and Granite Ventures.

HyTrust sells a hardware- or software-based appliance that gives administrators a central point from which to control access, policy management, security configuration and compliance in virtual environments. Analysts have praised HyTrust’s technology for solving authentication problems in VMware’s hypervisor with more granular auditing and security controls, and for letting administrators set policies that won’t be overridden by other tools.

In an announcement Wednesday HyTrust said the new funding will aid in development, sales and marketing.

Cisco’s investment is indicative of the network vendor’s increasing focus on virtualization. Cisco has developed software switches for virtualization deployments and its Unified Computing System uses VMware to create large pools of virtual resources. Cisco also recently teamed with NetApp and VMware on a security project designed to isolate applications sharing the same physical resources.

Even before receiving investment from Cisco, HyTrust had integrated its own products with Cisco’s Unified Computing System and the Nexus 1000v virtual switch. The funding announcement did not say how much of the $10.5 million was contributed by Cisco.

Follow Jon Brodkin on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jbrodkin

Read more about data center in Network World’s Data Center section.

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By Jeff Jedras and Paolo Del Nibletto
ITBusiness.ca
February 22, 2010

TORONTO - In a move that perhaps seemed inevitable as the one-time strong partners began to butt competitive heads more and more in the data centre, Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO) and Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) have ended the last vestiges of their partnership.

In a video blog, Keith Goodwin, senior vice-president of Cisco’s worldwide partner organization, confirmed Cisco was ending its system integrator contract with HP when it expires on April 30th, ending HP’s role as a both a Cisco Certified channel partner and a Global Service Alliance partner. HP also made a move to back away from Cisco, disclosing an agreement to resell QLogic Corp.-developed 8Gbit/sec Fibre Channel switches, an offering HP formerly sourced from Cisco.

In his video, Goodwin said that in recent years, Cisco and HP have begun to develop differing visions of how to deliver value in the data centre, leading to increased competition between the companies that led to the decision to end the partner relationship.

“Being a Cisco Certified Channel Partner has numerous benefits including access to proprietary information (such as product roadmaps) and partner profitability initiatives,” said Goodwin. “Given the evolution of our relationship it simply no longer makes sense to provide these benefits to HP.”

Cisco declined to comment on the move beyond Goodwin’s statement. HP Canada declined a request for interview, but did provide CDN with a statement saying history has proven that customers and the market demand both co-opetition and collaboration between IT vendors and that most major players compete in one deal and partner in others to best serve clients’ needs, adding HP doesn’t believe it’s in the customer’s best interest to take a proprietary stance.

“We will provide clients with consulting, integration, management and support services for their heterogeneous environments and ensure that our hardware and software platforms are optimized for all leading networking platforms,” said HP. “Our strategy and platforms will continue to be market driven to create advantage today and into the future for our clients.”

Competition between the two companies, once erstwhile partners, has become heated in recent years. HP’s expansion of its ProCurve networking portfolio, and its acquisition of networking equipment vendor 3Com late last year have seen the vendor take direct aim at Cisco’s market. And with moves such as its Unified Computing System (UCS) and its expanding data centre vision, Cisco has also been moving into HP’s bread and butter. Executives from the two vendors have also been waging an increasingly pointed war of words.

Still, the ties between the two companies run deep, particularly on the services side. In Canada, HP is Cisco’s largest partner. And particularly with the former EDS business within HP, HP has a lot of Cisco customers to support. Goodwin said Cisco will honour those service contracts for their duration, and has reached-out to HP to work on a “new agreement that ensures business continuity for existing customers and better reflects the current state of our relationship,” but the future remains unclear.

If there’s a big winner from Cisco’s move, it could be partner Dimension Data. Adam Jura, a senior analyst with Ovum, said it’s clear that HP needs Cisco more than Cisco needs HP, and with Cisco’s 3com acquisition and QLogic partnership likely to take time to bear fruit, there’s an opportunity for Cisco’s other partners, such as Dimension Data, to capitalize on the void.

“Cisco will need to be able to have better business value conversations with clients, as HP has been clearly superior in this area. With this change in direction, Cisco will still require someone to implement its products going forward,” said Jura. “Hence, the major winners out of this will be the remaining partners, in particular Dimension Data, which is continuing to impress in its performance in the Cisco products and solutions implementation space. In light of Cisco’s strategy of enabling versus competing against partner services offerings, expect, in particular, DiData to be blessed with more attention from Cisco going forward.”

Many unanswered questions

Paul Edwards, director of SMB and channels research with IDC Canada, said he was surprised by Cisco’s decision to drop HP. While the two companies have been butting heads more and more, he noted such “co-opition” is far from uncommon in the IT industry.

“We need more details,” said Edwards. “What does it mean when they’ve basically taken away their partner status, yet they’re talking about continuing to work with HP within accounts?”

However, Edwards said the move shouldn’t impact the VAR channel relationships for either companies. Cisco partners will likely continue to lead with Cisco, and HP partners with HP, but those partners with feet in both camps could face some pressure from the two vendor.

“It’s up to each of those vendors to take those partners and try to get them as the lead networking equipment provider,” said Edwards. “It might get tricky.”

The decision to drop HP was seen as largely inevitable by James Alexander, senior vice-president, Info-Tech Research Group, calling it a bit of a proverbial closing the barn door after the horse has left, given the increasingly fierce competition between the two companies.

“I think for both sides it signals a growing recognition in the IT community that data centres are being re-engineered and that the transport layer of the data centre is an integral part of how next-generation data centres will be designed,” said Alexander. “Both companies clearly have a strategy to implement that, and HP is moving into the networking space as quickly as Cisco is moving into servers and storage.”

It remains to be seen how it will play-out on the services side. Noting, however, that 10-years post-Y2K there is a massive infrastructure renewal opportunity looming, it is an opportunity for HP to gain market share for its own infrastructure offerings via its enlarged services business. However, he notes HP should also be leary, as it’s an opportunity as well as for competitors such as IBM to fill that void with Cisco offerings.

“There is a tipping-point, and the data centre is up for grabs,” said Alexander. “It’s game on.”

Partner reaction is mixed

The reaction from Canadian VAR partners of the two vendors to the news is mixed. Ottawa-based PureLogic IT Solutions is both an HP and a Cisco partner, and president Coreen Bouchard would like more information from both vendors on what this all means.

“PureLogic IT resold HP Blade Centre, which has many Cisco networking modules. We procured it from HP and it worked really well for us and our customers,” said Bouchard. “This decision will have an effect on our customers. I would like to know what happens next in terms of an exit strategy and support strategy. I really need to know.

For David Chow, president Ottawa-based Stoneworks Technologies and also both an HP and Cisco partner, the parting of Cisco and HP comes at a bad time as his company moves into unified communications.

“While I understand this move because it creates competition, I also believe that it was creating brand loyalty in the channel. What they are doing is creating some bad feelings towards those who rep both sides,” said Chow. “They’re forcing us to choose one or the other and quietly putting pressure on the reseller to go with us or them. I do not think it’s fair to ask those who make sales for these companies to do that.”

It’s seen as a good move though by Pierre Salbaing, owner of Montreal-based Services Avance Reseaux, a Cisco gold partner, who calls it a courageous decision for Cisco to drop a company that may be its largest worldwide UC reseller.

“What it means is that HP has real competitive solutions to Cisco and it may signal to partners that there’s another networking and services player up against Cisco. It could be a good plan B,” said Salbaing. “This is a rare decision for a company like Cisco who embraces partners like no other. To make a change to its partner base like this one it says that HP has maybe the best option against Cisco.

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By Stephen Lawson
IDG News Service (San Francisco Bureau)
February 4, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - Cisco Systems’ results for its fiscal quarter ended last month indicate the world economy is entering a second phase of recovery, Chairman and CEO John Chambers said Wednesday.

Cisco posted revenue of US$9.8 billion in the second quarter of its 2010 fiscal year, ended Jan. 23, an 8 percent increase from a year earlier. Its net income was $1.9 billion, or $0.32 per share, up 23 percent from the quarter a year earlier.

“Our outstanding Q2 results exceeded our expectations and we believe they provide a clear indication that we are entering the second phase of the economic recovery. During the quarter we saw dramatic across the board acceleration and sequential improvement in our business in almost all areas,” Chambers said in the company’s earnings press release.

Not counting certain one-time items, the dominant networking vendor earned $0.40 per share, exceeding analysts’ consensus expectation of $0.35 per share, according to a survey by Thomson Reuters. The analysts had forecast revenue of $9.4 billion, a number Cisco also exceeded.

“Q2 clearly was another tipping point,” Chambers said on a conference call following the announcement.

“Every time we’ve seen anything close to this, we’ve seen very solid recovery,” Chambers said. “It feels very good.”

Cisco marked its 25th anniversary during the quarter, even as it moved farther beyond its roots in switching and routing with wireless, consumer electronics and server products. In November, the company dove deeper into virtualized data centers as it formed a coalition in which EMC will provide storage components and VMware will contribute its software to work with Cisco’s Unified Computing System server platforms. Also during the quarter, it closed the earlier acquisitions of mobile infrastructure vendor Starent, for about US$2.9 billion, and of software-as-a-service company ScanSafe.

Cisco said it expects continued strong results, with revenue in the current quarter rising between 23 percent and 26 percent from a year earlier.

As a measure of its confidence, the company said it now plans to hire between 2,000 and 3,000 people over the next several quarters and has already begun that process. It will add employees across all types of jobs to pursue strategic opportunities, including entering new markets. Cisco is moving into 30 new “market adjacencies,” Chambers said.

Results improved across virtually all regions and product categories after major declines in the previous quarter, Cisco said. Overall product orders worldwide rose 11 percent, after a drop in the “high single digits” the previous quarter. The U.S. led the way in the recovery, with orders rising 17 percent. Cisco’s orders from U.S. service providers were up more than 20 percent.

Orders rose 4 percent in Europe and more than 10 percent in the Asia-Pacific region, while Cisco had mixed results in emerging markets, with flat orders overall.

Switching revenue rose 13 percent and routing was up about 2 percent. While high-end routing revenue increased 12 percent, sales of midrange and low-end routers fell from a year earlier.

Revenue from Cisco’s advanced technologies gained about 1 percent after having fallen 15 percent the previous quarter. Some of those technologies, such as unified communications, rose strongly while others fell. For example, storage network sales fell 1 percent and application networking products dropped 7 percent.

The Unified Computing System architecture announced last March has made strong inroads, according to Cisco executives, with orders doubling from the previous quarter. The company now has about 400 UCS customers, with most of them at the pilot or implementation stage. Chambers expects that business to easily bring in $1 billion in revenue this year.

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By Matt Hamblen
Computerworld (US)
February 4, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Cisco Systems Inc. plans to add voice-over-Wi-Fi capabilities to its existing iPhone app by April, part of a continuing effort to expand its unified communications technology into the mobile space.

The current iPhone Cisco Mobile app requires users to have a Cisco Unified Mobility Advantage server installed at a business. The server is usually administered by a company’s IT department.

Cisco Mobile already gives iPhone users quick access to many of the standard Cisco IP features, such as visual voicemail and Mobile Connect, software that can route calls from a work number through a company’s phone switching network and then out to an iPhone. The iPhone client software is free.

Cisco sees voice over Wi-Fi for the iPhone as a less expensive way to communicate because it would eliminate the need to use cellular voice minutes when placing a call in a Wi-Fi zone, said Laurent Philonenko, general manager of Cisco’s unified communications business unit.

The upcoming version, to be called Cisco Mobile Voice, will also be free and is expected to be available by April. Among the new features it will offer is “shake to lock,” which allows a user to end a call with a simple shaking gesture of the phone, he said. Another, named “call preservation,” allows a phone call to stay connected, even if a user opens a different application in the iPhone.

Cisco is also developing another iPhone application for voice-activated dialing. That app can be launched by bringing the phone to the ear and speaking, since the iPhone’s accelerometer detects the movement. It will be part of the Web 2.0 IP Telephony Widget.

Philonenko spoke to reporters in Boston and other cities from San Jose, Calif. via videoconference and was joined in Madison, Wisc., by Pat Scheckel, vice president of converged infrastructure solutions for CDW, which resells computers and related gear to businesses.

CDW, which has 3,500 customer deployments of Cisco’s mobile and unified communications technology globally, has already worked with one manufacturing company that has implemented voice over Wi-Fi using Nokia smartphones and Cisco 7925 IP phones, Scheckel said. “They had exorbitant cell phone bills and now just use Wi-Fi,” he noted.

Philonenko said it is important for Cisco to bring its mobility apps to iPhone, which has gained ground in large businesses in the past two years. Cisco eventually plans to bring all of its mobility applications to Nokia and BlackBerry devices, and, later, Android phones, he said. “Android is not yet a big factor in the enterprise ,” he said. “And we think Windows Mobile will re-emerge….

“The iPhone came from nowhere and companies like CDW are now deploying them by the thousands,” Philonenko said. With smartphone devices proliferating, cell networks seem to have saturated the globe, “but there’s still not enough 3G bandwidth for what people want to do.” As a result, Wi-Fi is seen as a relief valve, raising the value of voice over Wi-Fi, he added.

Cisco, which offers Webex collaboration software as well, is tracking the growing importance of social networking, Philonenko added. “Everything we do [at Cisco] is going to be mobilized,” he said.

Matt Hamblen covers mobile and wireless, smartphones and other handhelds, and wireless networking for Computerworld . Follow Matt on Twitter at @matthamblen or subscribe to Matt’s RSS feed . His e-mail address is mhamblen@computerworld.com .

Read more about networking and internet in Computerworld’s Networking and Internet Knowledge Center.

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By John Mark V. Tuazon

In the dog-eat-dog world of the competitive enterprise, keeping up to pace with the latest developments in technology becomes vital for survival, especially after a crucial time of economic crisis. For the coming year, experts therefore agree: agility and mobility becomes the core battleground of competition for companies to stay afloat. In the workplace of 2010 as predicted by top network vendors interviewed exclusively by Computerworld Philippines, executives have relevant information at their fingertips, employees utilize the power of the Web in collaborating for their work, and everyone will be connected to their home base whenever and wherever they may be. “There is an increasing movement towards the ‘Connected Life’,” quips Stephen Misa, country manager for Cisco Systems Philippines. Misa sees personal technologies such as smartphones and social networking infiltrating the corporate sphere, simultaneously as the workplace begins to move out of the conventional office building.

A Networking Facelift

Due to the increasing demand for content—especially video, which Misa describes as “the killer application” that will drive the next generation of productivity and innovation—corporate and service provider networks would have to be upgraded. The potentials of Web 2.0, specifically social networking, will ring in more demand for bandwidth, especially as consumers—who are also employees—continue to drive the popularity of such tools. “Companies need to re-evaluate the tools they offer their employees, and service providers need to re-engineer their networks,” Misa notes.

Social networking, however, will remain a marginal portion of the company’s network bandwidth, as bandwidth-hungry video redefines bandwidth requirements and Internet traffic for most firms. “Our Telepresence offering once again grew in excess of 100% year-over-year in the first quarter of 2009, proving that customers truly understand the productivity and value that video delivers both internally and with their own customers and partners.”

With this incessant hunger for richer content delivered through the office, Misa says providers must graduate from merely providing basic voice or data services, and move to become “experience providers” delivering an integrated set of data, voice, video, and mobile services to retain customers.

The Everywhere, Every Time, Everyone Office

However, pushing content to the office—a stable and stationary placeholder of content—is just half the battle for network administrators and providers. As more and more devices offer portability and mobility not only to consumers but to professional users as well, the four walls of the office become irrelevant.

“Corporate users want all information at their fingertips, and to stay connected with the office and clients while still being able to do business in the field,” posits Desmond Toh, marketing director, D-Link.

As corporate users continue to access the Web even outside their offices, Toh says the demand for Internet connectivity on-the-go will ramp up by next year. “Broadband and the network have [actually] become the fourth utility after water, gas, and electricity,” asserts Cisco’s Misa.

More importantly, as new innovations break barriers in terms of access, productivity is heightened due to the liberalizing capabilities of collaboration. “Tools are being developed to enable workers to communicate and collaborate seamlessly with one another, with their partners and with their customers,” Misa explains. Bart Burstein, vice president for product management and business development of Ruckus Wireless, would like to call this innovation as “distributed computing.” “Businesses are becoming more mobile, enabling corporate users, for example, to edit a speech or a press statement on the go, in real time, and in collaboration with other workers,” he shares. For such enablers, Burstein says connectivity requirements are heightened. “High-quality and reliable broadband access is therefore needed to do distributed computing,” he adds.

3G as Enterprise Enabler

3G technology, currently touted as the messiah that will integrate both mobile computing and high-speed access through wireless broadband capabilities, will become increasingly important in the coming years, and may even trigger the growth of more mobile users.
“In terms of access, 3G is increasingly being used by businesses,” claims Mantosh Malhotra, Philippine country manager, Qualcomm, a 3G technology innovator for device manufacturers. “With 3G, information can be fed real-time to the server.”

According to Malhotra, 3G enables companies to drive up its productivity output and ensure that downtime is kept to a minimum. These innovative products, D-Link’s Toh said, will allow users to enjoy broadband experience with full mobility. But aside from the access side, Malhotra notes how more and more targeted devices utilizing 3G technology are slowly becoming mainstream. “With the robust 3G ecosystem, manufacturers are increasingly becoming secure that their investments in 3G are protected, thereby ramping up the production of 3G devices, and driving down its costs, making it more affordable,” he explains.

Ruckus Wireless’ Burstein, on the other hand, sees a similar trend in devices, as more and more gadgets move towards “miniaturization.” “The trend for miniaturization of devices will mean more work will be done on smartphones and netbooks, as these devices become more affordable,” he says, adding that due to this, the percentage of smartphone usage in the enterprise will escalate.

Virtualization to Continue as a Trend

On the other half of the network spectrum, vendors see virtualization going through most of 2010, with a slight entrance of cloud computing as it slowly captures more industries. “Most technologies will be based on Internet delivery and infrastructure,” details Jojo Colina, head of product management and development group, ePLDT. Colina said cloud computing will play the largest part of organizations’ network bandwidth, as utility computing infrastructure sitting on top of their virtualization strategies become commonplace. “Companies who don’t have the infrastructure to deploy applications can look to providers in provisioning the needed software,” he adds.

With an increasing demand for faster access, richer content and a more mobile environment, Cisco’s Misa concludes that virtualization has finally become the hot topic for CIOs. “They are increasingly being challenged to manage more and more computing assets while keeping a cap on complexity and costs,” he explains.

“Virtualization, therefore, will mean better management of IT resources, enabling companies to become more agile and respond more quickly to macro-economic and customer shifts.”

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