Ericsson and Cisco Win IP/MPLS Project with Cable & Wireless

Ericsson and Cisco announced a joint service provider customer.  Cable & Wireless Communications has selected Ericsson to deliver an IP/MPLS network in three markets: the Bahamas, Jamaica and Barbados. The project includes an upgrade to the IP backbone network in the Bahamas to improve performance and support an increase of traffic, and a new business-to-business IP/MPLS network in Jamaica and Barbados. Financial terms were not disclosed.

The deal includes Cisco routers and switches (ASR9000, ASR900 and WR4500 families), supply and installation of NMS system (EPN-M), overall project management, and customer support.

"Our teams complemented each other with the right approach, from network analysis and planning to systems integration and customer support from Ericsson, to selecting the right routers and switches from Cisco, and finally ensuring the right flow along every step with Ericsson services," says Clayton Cruz, Vice President Ericsson Latin America and Caribbean. "The partnership has delivered real value to Cable & Wireless in terms of accelerating their IP transformation by combining end-to-end business transformation competence and experience with deep product and domain expertise."

"Cisco and Ericsson working together have the combined breadth, depth and lifecycle engagement required to help operators like Cable & Wireless succeed in their transformation to an IP-centric network," says Jordi Botifoll, Cisco President Latin America & Senior Vice President in the Americas. "Working together on this project will lead Cable & Wireless to a standardized approach across other markets, so that all their business-to-business and IP fixed networks will be supported by IP/MPLS, helping them do things better and faster."

The companies said that they currently have over 200 active customer engagement, some of which have now started to turn into won deals. Previously, the companies announced deals with 3 Italy, Vodafone Portugal and Aster Dominican Republic earlier this year.

In November 2015, Ericsson and Cisco formed a global business and technology partnership. The first product from the partnership, Ericsson Dynamic Service Manager, was announced in February 2016.

http://www.ericsson.com
http://www.cisco.com

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OIF Launches 100G Serial Electrical Links

The Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) has begun work on a 100G Serial Electrical Link project.

The very short reach (VSR) CEI-112G chip-to-module interface project will support a nominal lane rate of 112 Gb/s, enabling narrower interfaces to optical modules and is expected to be more energy efficient than previous interfaces. The CEI-112G-VSR specification doubles data rates over the current generation CEI-56G-VSR interfaces.

The OIF said this work will be followed by both shorter and longer reach projects.

“As bandwidth increases, electrical interfaces need to reflect that trend. Given the lead times, development of standards for the next generation of electrical links needs to start now,” said David Stauffer of Kandou Bus and the OIF’s Physical and Link Layer Working Group Chair and board member. “The OIF is continuing its roadmap for 100 Gb/s thru 400 Gb/s and beyond applications, addressing multiple reaches for chip-to-chip and chip-to module interfaces.”

http://www.oiforum.com

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A10: Malware Hidden in SSL Traffic Poses Growing Threat

Nearly half of cyber attacks used malware hidden in encrypted traffic to evade detection, according to a new report from A10 Networks based on a survey conducted in partnership with Ponemon Institute of 1,023 IT and IT security practitioners in North America and Europe. A full 80% of organizations were victims of cyber attacks during the past year.

The problem of malware hidden in SSL traffic poses a serious threat to organization who are increasingly relying on encrypted traffic to protect their workflows. SSL hides data from both potential attackers and from common security tools.

A10 Networks said many network managers mistakenly believe that there will be a performance penalty for inspecting inbound and outbound SSL traffic.

“IT decision makers need to think more strategically,” said Dr. Chase Cunningham, director of cyber operations at A10 Networks. “The bad guys are looking for ROI just like the good guys, and they don’t want to work too hard to get it. Instead of focusing on doing everything right 100 percent of the time, IT leaders can be more effective by doing a few things very strategically with the best technology available. It’s the cyber security equivalent of the zombie marathon — as long as you can avoid being the slowest in outrunning the zombies, you minimize risk.”

Some highlights of the survey:

• Almost half of respondents (47 percent) cited a lack of enabling security tools as the primary reason for not inspecting decrypted web traffic—closely followed by insufficient resources and degradation of network performance (both 45 percent). 
• 80 percent of survey respondents say their organizations have been victims of a cyber attack or malicious insider during the past year. And nearly half say that the attackers used encryption to evade detection.
• Although 75 percent of survey respondents say their networks are at risk from malware hidden inside encrypted traffic, roughly two-thirds admit that their company is unprepared to detect malicious SSL traffic.

“The Hidden Threats in Encrypted Traffic study sheds light on important facts about the malicious threats lurking in today’s corporate networks,” said Dr. Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder, Ponemon Institute. “Our goal is to help organizations better understand the risks to help them better address vulnerabilities in their networks.”

https://www.a10networks.com/

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VMware Builds its Container Capabilities

VMware unveiled two new capabilities of VMware vSphere Integrated Containers, which enables IT operations teams to provide a Docker compatible interface to their app teams, running on their existing vSphere infrastructure.

New container registry and management console features round out VMware vSphere Integrated Containers to further help IT teams operate containers in production with confidence.

It is now available as open source software and registration for a beta program is now open.

"A significant challenge for most enterprises is moving their containerized applications into production considering the variety of operational requirements," said Ray O'Farrell, executive vice president and chief technology officer, VMware.

"Relying on our enterprise know-how, we're delivering VMware vSphere Integrated Containers to dramatically simplify the delivery of containers and application services into production in virtual environments whether on-premises or in the public cloud. Application development teams can benefit from the flexibility, portability and speed of containers while IT benefits from the security, visibility and management capabilities

http://vmware.com/vicbeta

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Cisco Acquires ContainerX for Management Console

Cisco has acquired ContainerX, a start-up offering a console for managing Docker containers. Financial terms were not disclosed.

ContainerX, which is based in San Jose, California, promises "a single pane of glass for all your containers" where running on Bare Metal or VM, Linux or Windows, private or public cloud. The company describes its product as the world’s first multi-tenant container-as-a-service (CaaS) platform for both Linux and Windows. ContainerX also provides APIs for enterprises wanting to integrate the platform’s capabilities into their custom management portals.

The company was founded in 2015 by a seasoned team of entrepreneurs, PhDs and engineers from VMware, Microsoft and Citrix.

http://containerx.io/
http://www.cisco.com

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VMware Revs its OpenStack 3 Release

VMware announced the latest release of its OpenStack distribution, which is now based on the OpenStack Mitaka release.

New capabilities allow customers to use existing VMware vSphere workloads in an API-driven OpenStack cloud.

"Leveraging our experience and history of contributions to OpenStack, we've focused on streamlining deployment, operations and upgrades to help IT deliver an OpenStack cloud in a predictable fashion and time frame. The faster IT deploys the cloud, the faster developers get access to OpenStack services and APIs to build new apps and services that differentiate the business," said Ajay Singh, senior vice president and general manager, Cloud Management Business Unit, VMware.

http://www.vmware.com

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