N+I: Networking vendors urged to keep innovating

From...

By Michael Meehan

LAS VEGAS, Nevada (IDG) -- Giving the first keynote speech at Tuesday's Networld+Interop show, Alcatel CEO and Chairman Serge Tchuruk insisted that networking and telecommunications vendors can't afford to stop innovating while the market remains soft.

Tchuruk said the Paris-based vendor plans to spend $2.4 billion in research and development this year, pursuing users in the midst of real-time application projects.

"Instant reactivity is the name of the game today," he said.

Yet during a press panel after his speech, Tchuruk acknowledged that no single vendor can offer that instant reactivity by itself. He said that vendors like Alcatel, Cisco Systems Inc. and Nortel Networks Ltd. won't be able to deliver high-speed converged voice/video/data networks if the carriers that supply wide-area network connectivity don't make similar upgrades to their own systems.

IDG.net INFOCENTER Computerworld main page Computerworld's topic-oriented communities Computerworld's IT career center Free daily newsletters Related IDG.net Stories Voice-over-IP is front and center at Networld+Interop N+I: Remote access redux N+I: Cisco drills into content networking Features PC World.com Product Finder Mastering e-commerce by degrees Fast-track training puts nontechies in IT jobs Visit an IDG site Choose a site: IDG.net CIO Computerworld Darwin Dummies.com GamePro.com The Industry Standard ITWorld.com InfoWorld.com JavaWorld LinuxWorld Macworld Online Network World Fusion PC World Publish.com UnixInsider IDG.net search

And the slow economy hasn't inspired many to bravery.

"The [telecommunications] carriers are going to use every trick, every gimmick, to delay investment," Tchuruk said.

Meanwhile, vendors are trotting out their latest and greatest products for the show in the hopes that they can find a market, which proved elusive during the past year.

Santa Clara, California-based 3Com Corp. has announced a new 10 Gigabit Ethernet strategy, promising data center switches capable of using that technology by the middle of next year.

Brampton, Ontario-based Nortel Networks today unveiled a new routing product that merges dynamic routing and virtual private networking into one device. The company promises that the technology will "effectively eliminate the trade-off between security and performance."

Cisco will trot out more than a dozen new routers and switches, in addition to new content networking and security solutions.

Hewlett-Packard Co. has a new set of Layer 2/3/4 switches that it said contain a new chip that replicates what its competitors need multiple chips to accomplish.

Olivier Houssin, president of Alcatel's e-business group, said applications that take advantage of bigger, faster, better-organized networks will be what ultimately conquer the current buyers' malaise.

"It's not a box that tries to be a little bit faster, a little bit cheaper than everybody else," he said. "Everyone promises that."