SANTA CLARA, Calif., June 4, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Foundry Networks(r), Inc. (Nasdaq:FDRY), a performance and total solutions leader for end-to-end switching and routing, today announced that Servico Federal de Processamento de Dados (SERPRO), Brazil's largest public technology application service provider, selected Foundry's core-to-edge routing and switching solutions to connect more than 100 geographically distributed Brazilian agencies. The newly installed Foundry-powered network is essential for maintaining constant communication and improving the efficiency of critical data transactions between branch offices.
In the Brazilian market, IP connectivity is not only critical but also abundant among consumers, businesses and government agencies. According to 2006 data by Internet World Statistics, Brazil ranks among the top ten countries worldwide with the highest number of Internet users. To keep up with this rising trend, inter-agency multi-gigabit connectivity is essential for SERPRO's ability to grow and maintain ongoing communication. SERPRO currently manages more than one billion online transactions per year, including data transmitted from finance, imports and exports, vehicle registration and approximately 20 million income-tax returns. Due to this information's urgency and extremely sensitive content, a highly advanced and resilient network is a vital requirement for SERPRO's ongoing daily operations.
"Application and file sharing communication between our more than 100 agencies around Brazil has become the integral component of our daily operation," said Nauro Scheufler, network technology manager for SERPRO. "In order to manage such a high volume of data communication we needed to move to a next generation infrastructure that can support our demanding needs today and easily scale with anticipated growth. Competitive products on the market cannot compare to Foundry's price for performance, reliability and support, making them the clear choice for our core-to-edge network enhancement. The results we obtained demonstrate we made the right direction. We estimate that during the first year of operation, the Brazilian Government will save approximately $4 Million with the new infrastructure upgrades."
In order to connect their numerous dispersed agencies, SERPRO selected nearly 250 of Foundry's switches and routers for the upgrade. At the network core, SERPRO installed Foundry's award-winning NetIron XMR routers for 10 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) connectivity between key sites within their Metropolitan Area Network (MAN). The Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) capabilities of the NetIron XMR played a key role in SERPRO's selection of Foundry. Using MPLS, SERPRO is able to efficiently accelerate data communication over their IP network. This improves the speed of packet processing and enhances performance of the network allowing SERPRO to take advantage of its full benefits. The NetIron XMR Series has an industry-leading 128 10GbE ports in a single chassis and offers wire-speed performance on all ports, independent of the services that are enabled on the system. Purpose-built for the growing broadband service provider infrastructure, the NetIron XMR Series enables the deployment of scalable and mission critical services while offering enormous headroom for future growth in a provider's network. Additionally, it offers highly versatile, cost-efficient solutions for Internet routing, metro core, large-scale IP backbones and IP carrier's carrier transport.
Scheufler added, "Our challenge was to get the networks up and running as soon as possible with minimal downtime. Using Foundry switches and routers, our network was operational after the first switch install due to the ease of configuration and management. Our previous experiences with other vendor offerings were not nearly as successful."
To help scale business-critical IP and Web applications to 10Gbps performance, SERPRO installed Foundry's ServerIronGT E Series of application switches. The ServerIronGT E Series 10-GbE switch offers higher expansion capacity with a four-slot design and features front power supplies for enhanced serviceability. The management modules, line modules and SSL service modules are interchangeable between the two chassis, thus offering added expansion flexibility for the future.
Rounding out their infrastructure, an extensive set of Foundry's FastIron family of compact and modular Layer 2/3 switches were installed to provide 10 GbE uplink to the core and GbE connectivity within their multi-tenant units (MTU). The FastIron family offers industry-leading 10-Gigabit Ethernet switch density, leading Layer 2 and Layer 3 scalability for demanding Enterprise LAN applications. With superior hardware redundancy, advanced hardware feature set, such as fine-grain bandwidth management, and wire-speed network monitoring and accounting features, the FastIron family is ideal for demanding converged enterprise networks, high performance computing environments, and customer-facing service provisioning.
The integration and project deployment was lead by Vernet Comunicacao de Dados, one of Foundry's Brazilian integrators. "We reached a milestone in the federal environment sector. This is one of the largest and most complex federal MANs ever built to support government IT needs," said Alexandre Franca, general manager for Vernet.
"We are honored SERPRO and the Brazilian government selected Foundry for their complete network upgrade," said Ken Cheng, Foundry vice president and general manager, high value systems business unit. "Large scale MANs that transfer highly sensitive government information require a secure, high-performance and scalable solution end-to-end. Foundry service provider switching and routing solutions deliver on these requirements with a capital and operational cost benefit other vendors cannot match."
For more information on Servico Federal de Processamento de Dados (SERPRO) visit www.serpro.gov.br
About Foundry Networks
Foundry Networks, Inc. (Nasdaq:FDRY) is a leading provider of high-performance enterprise and service provider switching, routing, security and Web traffic management solutions, including Layer 2/3 LAN switches, Layer 3 Backbone switches, Layer 4-7 application switches, wireless LAN and access points, and metro routers. Foundry's customers include the world's premier ISPs, metro service providers, and enterprises, including e-commerce sites, universities, entertainment, health and wellness, government, financial and manufacturing companies. For more information about the company and its products, call 1.888.TURBOLAN or visit www.foundrynet.com.
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