Cisco chief executive John Chambers' prediction long ago that video
one day would disrupt the Internet is nearly a reality. The company
announced a powerful router designed to help make that prediction
come true.
With 100G networks still something of a Holy Grail in networking,
Cisco believes its new CRS-3 router will represent a powerful
central nervous system for enterprises wishing to reach that goal.
The Federal Communications Commission is a proponent of sweeping
broadband improvements, which are articulated in its National
Broadband Plan to Congress.
Cisco claims the CRS-3, which will be available in a few months for
prices beginning at USD 90,000 has 12 times the traffic capacity of
its nearest competing system. The Tuesday announcement was hyped
for weeks as an event that would "change the Internet forever," and
the implication now is that Cisco is betting on the CRS-3 as its
entry in the race to roll out 100G networks.
Pankaj Patel, SVP and general manager of Cisco's Service Provider
Business, predicted the CRS-3 will become the company's flagship
router of the future and will form the foundation of intelligent
and advanced broadband networks in the Internet.
The presentation also featured an appearance by AT&T's Keith
Cambron, who talked about the carrier's successful 100G field trial
between Florida and Louisiana as a harbinger of better networking
things to come. Cambron, who is president and CEO of AT&T Labs,
noted that AT&T's video traffic is growing at a rate of 80
percent a year.
AT&T has been under pressure to speed up its wireless network,
because its exclusive arrangement with Apple to provide the iPhone
has pressured AT&T's mobile network while the carrier's
landline broadband struggles to keep up with growing traffic.
Praising Cisco's CRS-3, Cambron said: "We are entering the next
stage of global communications and entertainment services and
applications, which requires a new set of advanced Internet
networking technologies. AT&T's network handled 40 percent more
traffic in 2009 than it did in the previous year and we continue to
see this growth in 2010."
Cisco said the CRS-3 has three times the scale of its CRS-1
predecessor and two times more service intelligence. It has a total
capacity of as much as 322 Terabits per second -- a metric that
translates to the downloading of the entire printed collection of
the Library of Congress in just over one second.
The CRS-3 has been developed to enable its users to access both
traditional networks and emerging data center clouds. The router
features a Network Positioning System that covers Layers 3 to 7
application information. Its cloud virtual private network with
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) paves the way for
"pay-as-you-go" services.
Cisco's new QuantumFlow Array processor, included in the CRS-3
design, enables users to access unprecedented levels of
applications and devices while consuming a low level of power,
according to Cisco.
In a sense, Cisco is travelling full circle in its Internet vision
-- from Chambers' prediction about video as a disruptive force, to
the CRS-3 and the firm's belief it will sit at the core of the
Internet vision with consumer video at the edge.