Edge to edge, Product to concentrate enterprise traffic across the WAN

Another member of the NetEdge Systems family of Edge multiservice access concentrators will be inaugurated at Supercomm. The Edge Model 70 enables service providers to connect fiber distributed data interface or token ring local area networks across a public network for transparent LAN service.

The new model addresses service providers' requests for a product they could use to connect customers' LANs - but with less functionality and at a lower cost - for smaller locations. Other Edge products have different interfaces, such as the high-end Model 85 with Ethernet, fast Ethernet, token ring and FDDI, and the Model 65 with just Ethernet and fast Ethernet.

Transparent LAN service is one way service providers use their asynchronous transfer mode backbone routes efficiently. With Edge products, a carrier can put several customers' traffic through the same pipes and switches for scales of economy, said Jon Fjeld, NetEdge vice president of marketing.

"It does away with the need for high-end routers on the enterprise network," said Laden Mestchian, analyst with The Yankee Group, Boston. "They can just use a low-end router and connect to the edge of the service provider's network."

The alternative solution would be to use a router and an ATM access device or other equipment with LAN interfaces, although neither solution is quite the same as the Edge products, Mestchian said.

Along with the box, NetEdge also said last week that software Release 2.2, to be available in July, will provide dynamic Internet protocol routing for virtual private networks controlled by service providers through Edge concentrators. Dynamic routing is different from static routing because the topology of traffic can change with the network's behavior, Fjeld said.

The whole Edge portfolio is built on a premise similar to the cable industry, with a single platform as the base for value-added services on top, he said.