ANDA Networks introduced a new central office Ethernet aggregation and transport product designed to handle large-scale Ethernet service delivery requirements for major carriers. The new EtherDAX 6000 is designed for the aggregation and cross connect of a larger number of ANDA Networks' EtherReach devices, or third party devices, to support and centrally manage thousands of subscribers from a single device in the central office.
Significantly, MCI recently selected ANDA for a key part of its Converged Packet Access (CPA) network, which is being deployed in major cities across the U.S. ANDA said its Ethernet access and aggregation equipment is now in deployments in many large carrier networks worldwide both because of its feature set and because of its aggressive pricing. The company is based in Sunnyvale, California but maintains a majority of its engineering staff in Wuhan, China.
The new EtherDAX 6000 scales up to 120 Gbps and will support traditional SDH/PDH interfaces from DS3/E3 up to OC-192 and next-gen interfaces from GigE, 10GigE Ethernet or potentially C/DWDM uplinks. The product provides TDM-to-packet, packet-to-packet, and packet-to-optical aggregation and forwarding to enable flexible service delivery options for the evolution to converged networks and optical Ethernet networks. The platform is a 12-slot, carrier-grade chassis with a 48 Gbps Ethernet switch fabric with MPLS support.
Modules are independent from the CPUs.
Key capabilities of ANDA's new product includes secure layer 2 transport/layer 3-aware networking capabilities, which could be used by carriers to backhaul traffic to the network core without needing additional deployments of service edge routers or switches. Carriers would then aggregate and backhaul as much traffic as possible to existing SONET/SDH nodes or IP based switch/routers to achieve lower overall network costs -- basically, "backhaul where you can' (over existing transport), and switch when you must."
ANDA is also positioning the EtherDAX 6000 to aid migrations from TDM-based Frame and private line network technologies via Ethernet over SONET usingX.86/GFP and/or emerging Pseudo-wire emulation standards (PWE3). The EtherDAX 6000 could be used in large CO based carrier deployments for metro Ethernet business class services. Future releases will include high-density channelized OC-3/STM-1 (DS1) and channelized OC-48/STM-16 (OC-3).
ANDA existing "EtherTone" portfolio includes:
- EtherEdge 4000 Series -- a multi-tenant unit and CO/PoP Ethernet access platform terminating up to 24 Ethernet/TDM/Frame Relay interfaces.
- EtherReach 3000 Series -- fixed configuration platforms for multi-tenant unit deployments with Ethernet and TDM interfaces for transport across SONET/SDH networks.
- EtherReach 2000 Series -- single customer, carrier managed NCTE devices that provide Ethernet and TDM services via copper and/or fiber facilities at a carrier price of $1,000 to $2,000.
- ANDA Networks was founded in 1998 by Wufu Chen and prominent network technology entrepreneurs from Cisco, Motorola, Alcatel, Nortel, Ericsson and HP. The company raised approximately $100 million in funding, developing a Universal Access Platform. When the telecom downturn hit, ANDA moved a majority of its R&D to China, a move that the company said enables it to develop new products at one-tenth the cost of its previous operating model.
- ANDA Networks is headed by Charles R. Kenmore. Prior to joining ANDA Networks, Mr. Kenmore's most recent responsibilities included president of ADC International; vice president and general manager of the international division of the information systems group at Motorola; founding head of Sprint International; and vice-president and general manager of the international systems integration division at Comsat.
