IXC, Cisco team up on packet future

IXC Communications announced an alliance with Cisco Systems under which the carrier will buy Cisco equipment and the companies will jointly develop Internet protocol-based internetworking technologies, such as packet-over-Sonet.

"We have been working with Cisco and other providers to build out our Gemini2000 high-speed packet-over-Sonet network," said Dominick J. DeAngelo, senior vice president of data services at IXC. The interexchange carrier plans to roll out Cisco's 12000 gigabit switch routers in the Gemini2000 OC-48 (2.5 Gb/s) network.

One IXC goal is to provide end-to-end IP solutions, which will help it move away from wholesale and into retail. Cisco's ties to the enterprise market should lend that effort credibility.

In addition, IXC gets access to Cisco engineers, who can help the carrier build packet-based services. Part of the plan is to use multiprotocol label switching, also called tag switching, throughout the backbone. IP virtual private networking, managed integrated services, voice over IP and packet video services are other areas of joint development.

"They won't all be new. Some will be enhancements of existing ideas," DeAngelo said.

"On the surface it looks straightforward: IXC is buying equipment and Cisco is getting revenue," said Mike Smith, managing director of Stratecast Partners. "But the deeper message is that IXC wants to move more aggressively into the retail space. They have not had success in that space," he said. "Qwest has achieved far more success than IXC has, and IXC has come to the realization that it needs a partner with more mind share than IXC has to really penetrate that space."