Service Providers Worldwide Driving Video/IPTV with Cisco IP NGN; Unmatched Global Experience, Proven Scalability and Open Solution Architecture Drive Cisco Deployment Leadership in Video/IPTV

Business Wire, Sept 9, 2005

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands -- Cisco Systems(R) (Nasdaq:CSCO) today announced continued momentum on its leadership with service providers around the world in delivery of video/IPTV services over its IP Next Generation Network (IP NGN) reference architecture.

Cisco has unmatched video/IPTV networking deployment experience, with platforms and technologies that enable scaling to millions of subscribers quickly and easily and with a lower total cost of ownership (TCO) than others. Cisco's approach enables providers to improve the subscriber experience and increase average revenue-per-subscriber (ARPU) by offering enhanced viewing options, improved security and proven reliability. This is based on improved service control, intelligence within the aggregation layer and scalability at the network core. The Cisco IP NGN architecture gives providers an open platform for service differentiation, allowing them to move beyond video/IPTV to develop and deliver a variety of integrated media services in the connected home.

"Cisco provides service providers with extensive experience in delivering video/IPTV and IP-based rich media services through a broad technology solution," said Mark Bieberich, Director, Communications Network Infrastructure, Yankee Group. "By addressing fundamental challenges in carrier IP networks and the connected home and combining proven routing, bandwidth management and service control offerings, Cisco IP NGN gives service providers the solutions required to guarantee end user quality-of-experience."

Video/IPTV requirements vary greatly depending on whether the service is a managed video application such as broadcast IPTV, an interactive communications service such as video conferencing or third-party content detection and management. Cisco offers an open, standards-based approach to video/IPTV deployment with multiple middleware vendors, headend platforms, conditional access devices, video servers and IP set-top boxes.

"Cisco's leadership in video deployments over IP can be attributed to continuously enabling providers to grow subscriber bases, increase revenues and reduce churn," said Mike Volpi, senior vice president and general manager of Routing and Service Provider Technology, Cisco. "We do this by enabling three layers of convergence -- network convergence, which saves providers money; service convergence, which binds networks and applications together; and application convergence, which helps them drive revenue. Only IP next generation networks that encompass all three can truly drive growth of advanced services, including video."

Cisco continues innovating to achieve its IP NGN vision with a number of video/IPTV-focused solutions and milestones:

Network Convergence

At the Network Convergence Layer of the IP NGN, Cisco video/IPTV deployments provide unparalleled linkages among the network, middleware and video/IPTV applications through the Carrier Routing System (CRS-1), the XR 12000 and 7600 Series routers, the Cisco Catalyst(R) switch family and optical networking equipment including the industry-leading Cisco ONS15454 multiservice provisioning/transport platform (MSPP/MSTP) and the Cisco ONS15600 multiservice switching platform (MSSP).

Cisco today announced general availability of the 8-port 1 Gigabit Ethernet (GE) shared port adapter (SPA) for the CRS-1, offering the industry's highest QoS-enabled GE port density. The CRS-1 now offers continuous scaling of up to 768 ports per rack and up to 55,296 ports per system. With high-density Ethernet aggregation and the industry's only multi-stage multicast, CRS-1 is designed to connect the super headend, video headend and video serving office (VSO) in national and metro networks.

Recent enhancements to the Cisco 7600 Series routing portfolio, ideally suited for distributed video and aggregation applications in national and metro networks, underscore leadership in working with service providers to build out scalable video/IPTV services. These include:

--Optimization of network utilization with Dynamic Multicast -- Minimizes providers' bandwidth needs for a larger number of live TV channels.

--TCO reduction with video/IPTV-optimized Asymmetric Networking -- Enables providers to deploy only the network bandwidth needed in each direction to support video services.

--Enhanced security with Source-specific Multicast (SSM) -- Designed to prevent distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

--Carrier-class video operation with Broadcast Source Redundancy -- Enables load sharing among live TV broadcast sources with dynamic failover.

Service Convergence

At the Service Convergence Layer of the IP NGN, Cisco continues to strengthen its ability to enhance end-user quality-of-experience (QoE) with service control intelligence in the Service Exchange Framework (SEF). The open SEF tightly integrates the network and application layers with middleware vendors, headend platforms, conditional access devices, video servers and IP set-top boxes.

--Intelligent service and bandwidth control with Cisco Broadband Policy Manager -- Provides universal subscriber access and automates policy control operations with business rules to deliver services. It is an open platform which seamlessly integrates Cisco products with OSS/BSS and multi-vendor networks.