Cisco Systems Delivers Switched Multiservice Network for the Fleet Financial Group; Cisco IGX 8400 Series Switch Enable Advanced Networking Features.

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 28, 1998--Cisco Systems, Inc. today announced that it has been selected to supply multiservice, wide-area network switches for the Fleet Financial Group's network backbone.

The new switches enable the diversified group of financial services companies to consolidate business-critical applications, automatic teller machine data traffic, voice and new applications over a single backbone.

Cisco will supply up to 70 Cisco IGX(TM) 8400 series multiservice switches capable of dynamically switching voice, legacy data, frame relay, and Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) traffic over a single backbone. The IGX 8400 series is a versatile, standards-based ATM switch capable of supporting a wide range of narrowband and broadband applications for enterprise networks and service providers.

Fleet Financial Group, headquartered in Boston, is an $85.5 billion diversified financial services company. Fleet is the sixth largest commercial lender and New England's leading small business lender. Fleet's lines of business include commercial banking, government banking, mortgage banking, corporate finance, commercial real estate lending, insurance services, discount brokerage services, equipment leasing and asset-based lending.

Fleet also provides investment management services for both individuals and institutional clients and currently has $75 billion in assets under management. With more than 1,200 branches and over 2,400 ATMs, Fleet also provides 24-hour telephone banking as well as electronic-banking services through the Fleet PC Banking Center. The IGX 8400 switched network will allow Fleet to consolidate multiple networks over a single wide-area switched backbone.

"Fleet requires 24x7 availability for all aspects of our business," said Frank DeJohn, vice president of network planning at Fleet Financial Group. "We chose the IGX 8400 switches because the Cisco solution produced the most efficient design, the highest availability and greater cost savings over competing solutions. The design guaranteed a 40 percent reduction in transmission costs and Cisco backed that up - we have actually achieved a 54 percent savings to date."

With the IGX 8400 switched backbone, Fleet will consolidate traffic from legacy applications, including SNA, frame relay, voice and their automatic teller-machine network over a single network. The network began initially with four IGX 8400 series switches, and will eventually include up to 70. It supports virtually all of the bank's services-SNA applications, voice, back-office services, channel services, teller applications and commercial loan applications.

Real-time traffic from cash machines is aggregated and routed to the IGX 8400 backbone for transmission to the main data center in Albany, N.Y., for processing. In addition, trunking between sites via the IGX network enables Fleet to cost-effectively move voice traffic between back offices onto the network.

"The IGX 8400 series switch delivers the industry's highest levels of reliability and availability," said Joe Golden, vice president of marketing with Cisco' Wide Area Network Business Unit. "The IGX's ability to provide virtual paths and dynamically allocate bandwidth between circuits increases application performance and availability. Maintenance can be performed while the system stays up, ensuring that business-critical applications continue to be available."

"We routinely perform 'hot cuts' now," DeJohn said, "where we remove an old node, install a new one, and cut applications over on the fly. We have a very high level of confidence in the Cisco equipment and network - so high, in fact, that we perform these hot cuts overnight."

The Fleet Financial Group has also deployed a number of Cisco routers and other Cisco products in the bank's LANs and branch networks. The IGX 8400 network integrates tightly with the router network, simplifying network management, support, and training.

Fleet expects the network to support emerging banking applications such as remote imaging, tape vaulting and video. This flexibility enables Fleet to cost-effectively deploy new customer applications that enhance customer satisfaction and provide a competitive edge. Fleet will also extend Frame Relay services to more than 1,200 branches using Cisco access devices that connect to public frame relay services.

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