Cisco Introduces First Products Under New CiscoBlue Strategy; Enhancements target data-center operations, wide-area connectivity and network management in SNA environments.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 18, 1996 -- Cisco Systems, Inc. today announced a set of products that improve the performance and management of enterprise networks that combine IBM's System Network Architecture (SNA) with other protocols.

The products implement the new CiscoBlue strategy for integrating SNA networks with high-performance, switched internetworks. The products address customer needs in three areas: the data center, wide-area network (WAN) connectivity and network management.

Data Center Enhancement

TN3270 Server is a new application available on Cisco's Channel Interface Processor (CIP), allowing TN3270 clients access to IBM mainframes. The software offloads 100 percent of the TCP/IP and TN3270 cycles from the mainframe, improving performance of both the network and the host system.

Each channel-attached CIP card in a Cisco 7000 family router can support up to 8,000 TN3270 sessions. Several CIP cards can be deployed in a single Cisco 7000 family router, enabling tens of thousands of simultaneous sessions. Data center configuration options allow load balancing and redundancy of sessions across multiple CIP cards and/or multiple Cisco routers, as well as access to multiple hosts.

The TN3270 application can coexist on a single CIP card with any or all of the other CIP applications: IP Datagram, TCP/IP Offload or CIP SNA. Both bus-and-tag and ESCON channel connections are supported.

WAN Backbone

The Cisco IOS software is being enhanced to allow integrated IBM internetworks to take greater advantage of new switched backbone offerings of public networks. Enhancements include Advanced Peer-to-Peer Networking (APPN) support for direct transport over Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM), Switched Multimegabit Data Service (SMDS) and Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN); Data Link Switching Plus (DLSw+) enhancements, including SNA dial-on-demand routing (DDR) and DLSw Lite; and Boundary Access Node (BAN) capability.

APPN enhancements include standards-compliant direct transport over ATM using RFC 1483 and ISDN using RFC 1661. APPN will now also support the point-to-point protocol (PPP) and SMDS transport. These media additions provide further media flexibility and allow enterprise networks to take advantage of cost effective switched services.

SNA DDR automatically brings up ISDN lines or other switched circuits for SNA traffic and allows them to drop during idle periods. It allows TCP transport pipes to be established only when there is data to send. This capability reduces ISDN line costs while maximizing availability and control of the central site resources required to support large dial-in networks. It is particularly applicable for small branch operations as a primary connection back to a data center or for transient connections to other branch offices or retail locations.

DLSw Lite provides reliable transport for SNA traffic over Frame Relay networks, without requiring the overhead of TCP/IP. While minimizing overhead, it still offers several key DLSw benefits such as broadcast reduction, dynamic searching and local acknowledgment.

BAN support in Cisco IOS software, an alternative to the Boundary Network Node (BNN) Cisco has supported since early 1995, allows SNA devices to connect directly to a front-end processor (FEP) over a Frame Relay network with minimal configuration at the branch office router.

Network Management

The CiscoWorks Blue suite of integrated network management capabilities, first disclosed in Q3 1995 with the announcement of Native Service Point, is enhanced with "Maps" and "SNA View." CiscoWorks Blue Maps permits customers to retrieve logical views of both SNA and IP networks that are dynamically updated.

SNA View overlays the SNA logical network to include physical units (PUs) and (LUs). By correlating SNA resource names to router ports on Simplified Network Management Protocol (SNMP) platforms, a new level of management is realized. The network administrator can then more easily solve and identify problems in the network or in the SNA environment, lowering costs and enhancing operations center productivity.

Product Availability

The TN3270 Server software is a separately licensed feature of the CIP card available for the Early Support Program in April 1996 and generally available in Q3 1996. DLSw Lite is available today. The new APPN media, SNA DDR and BAN will be available by the end of the month.

CiscoWorks Blue Maps shipments will begin this month. Remote source-route bridging (RSRB), APPN and DLSw+ will be the first available applications. CiscoWorks Blue SNA View is also available in March. Maps is a prerequisite product for SNA View.

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the leading global supplier of internetworking solutions, including routers, LAN and ATM switches, dial-up access servers and network management software. These products, integrated by the Cisco IOS software, link geographically dispersed LANs, WANs and IBM networks. Cisco news and product/service information are available at World Wide Web site http://www.cisco.com. Cisco Systems is headquartered in San Jose, Calif. -0-

Note to Editors: Cisco IOS and CiscoWorks are trademarks, and Cisco, Cisco Systems and the Cisco logo are registered trademarks of trademarks or registered service marks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners.

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