Enterasys identifies the key requirements for global enterprises

Enterasys Networks, a leader in enterprise networking solutions, has identified network security, availability and mobility as the three key requirements for global enterprises, and has announced proven solutions to consistently meet these goals.

At the recent launch of its SAM (security, availability and mobility) marketing initiative in South Africa, David Palmer-Stevens, visiting Enterasys Networks VP (Marketing), said on-demand access to an absolutely secure corporate network from anywhere in the world is now an attainable goal.

"Businesses the world over rely heavily on their ability to provide electronic content to employees, users, partners, customers and suppliers," said Palmer-Stevens. "This is true whether the content is transmitted via e-mail, web commerce and supply chain management, or more industry-specific applications such as digital x-ray imaging and education records.

"But until now, reliability and efficiency in the areas of security and availability of content were targets to be aimed at, not goals to be realised."

Palmer-Stevens said Enterasys Networks is singularly focused on being the primary content delivery provider to enterprise-class customers.

"Because companies increasingly depend on e-business and all forms of electronic communications, our goal is to offer solutions that ensure unrivalled content access," he stressed. "Even the most secure or mobile network is of little value if it does not provide on-demand access to all users."

Turning to network mobility, Palmer-Stevens said it is a fast-growing demand for organisations today, regardless of their industry.

"Education, healthcare, government and private businesses are all looking for more flexibility in their workforce, and this is driving the need for freedom and flexibility of both users and information.

"Wireless technology obviously contributes to more flexible network access, but mobility is more than simply the ability to connect to the network from anywhere," he said. "It is a holistic approach to productive working - with full access to secure corporate information and the Internet - at the office, at home and on the move."

In his presentation, Martin May, regional director for Enterasys Networks SA, said that as the world becomes increasingly more information-centric and dependent on the corporate network, the potential for loss is greater, and the need for complete security is magnified.

"The concepts of security, availability and mobility are central to meeting the growing demands voiced by enterprise-class customers for secure networking - from both the private and public-sectors - internationally and in South Africa," he says.

"Network security is now a high priority among senior executives and network managers, especially with so much vital company information being stored and exchanged electronically. The inability to control this information poses a real threat to the future of small and medium size businesses in this country."

May added that only through the deployment of all the elements in the SAM spectrum can network users best serve their many customers and suppliers, ensuring so that they may, in turn, realise the true potential of the global marketplace."

The solutions

Security: Enterasys Networks` Secure Harbour architecture is the industry`s first holistic approach to information security, protecting companies from the threat inside and outside of their physical boundaries. With over 60 to 70% of the risk coming from internal sources, Secure Harbour focuses on protecting information and physical computing assets inside the firewall, while tracking

users and information access across the entire network. Enterasys is able to do this, in part, through:

• User authentication at the points of network entry

• Intruder detection systems to seek out potential threats

• Bandwidth rate limiting to control and deter attacks

• Highly secure global VPN solutions

Through features like these and others found in the Enterasys product line, Secure Harbour offers an all-encompassing approach to information security, not a traditional point-product solution.

Availability:

Enterasys Networks has a long history of developing not simply highly redundant products, but feature-rich products that take availability to the next level. No one device is 100% reliable for life, so Enterasys has designed solutions that take into account device failure, and allow for the deployment of 100% available networks. Enterasys Networks (previously Cabletron Systems) was the first company to develop:

• Switch-level redundancy in our complete line of modular products

• Intelligent meshed backbones in Layer 2 networks to negate switch failure

• Fully resilient Layer 3/4 services across an entire switched backbone

Products like the X-Pedition, Matrix, Aurorean and NetSight all work together to create an enterprise that prevents delays or outages and ensures 24 x 7 network availability worldwide.

Mobility: Enterasys provides a total mobility solution through hardware and software features such as:

• Policy and directory services for control and flexibility

• Virtual LAN implementations allow complete connection flexibility

• VPNs provide secure, high-speed and low-cost solutions for a highly mobile workforce

The mobility of companies will be enhanced through the User Personalized Network (UPN), a new Enterasys initiative. The UPN concept will link the user, the network and the IT resource together in a way that delivers a unique perspective to the enterprise customer.