Extending the life of legacy Cisco networks with SmartCare

Gail Holt, Managing Director of Hardware Distribution.

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In today’s economic climate, many companies are under pressure to do more with less. Large-scale network refreshes are often postponed in favour of maximising the value of existing infrastructure, a strategy commonly known as “sweating the assets”. For many companies running legacy Cisco networks, SmartCare offers a practical, cost-effective way to extend network life and maintain products without immediate capital investment.

SmartCare, an SLA-driven maintenance and support service exclusive to Hardware Distribution, enables companies to confidently sweat their legacy Cisco assets until they can afford to upgrade.

“Too often, companies feel pressured into replacing perfectly functional Cisco equipment simply because it has reached an arbitrary vendor milestone,” says Gail Holt, Managing Director of Hardware Distribution. “SmartCare gives customers a credible, supported alternative that puts business priorities, not OEM timelines, first.”

Cisco networks are renowned for their durability and engineering quality. Many switches, routers and firewalls continue to perform reliably well beyond their initial depreciation schedules. However, once equipment reaches Cisco’s End-of-Support (EOS) or End-of-Life (EOL) milestones, companies often face a stark choice: upgrade immediately or have no vendor support.

For many businesses, particularly in healthcare, finance, manufacturing and public sector, immediate replacement is neither budget-friendly nor operationally feasible. Sweating assets becomes a strategic decision, freeing capital for improvement elsewhere while extracting maximum value from proven infrastructure.

“We regularly see customers running Cisco infrastructure that is technically EOL but operationally solid,” Holt explains. “The challenge isn’t performance; it’s access to reliable support and spares. That’s exactly the gap SmartCare is designed to fill.”

SmartCare is a comprehensive SLA-based maintenance service designed specifically to support legacy Cisco network environments. It provides 8x5xNBD hardware swap-out long after OEM coverage ends, ensuring networks remain functional and operational.

Rather than forcing a premature refresh, SmartCare allows companies to extend the usable life of Cisco assets without any risk in the event that any of the products fail.

“SmartCare isn’t about avoiding innovation,” says Holt. “It’s about giving customers breathing room and time to plan upgrades properly without major capital expenditure, rather than making rushed decisions under pressure.”

At the heart of SmartCare is a robust service level agreement that mirrors traditional vendor support expectations. This includes:

• Fault logging 24/7
• Guaranteed response and resolution times
• Advanced hardware replacement, including next-business-day swap, or on-site spares
• Access to spare parts EOL equipment

These SLAs transform legacy hardware from a perceived liability into dependable, fully supported assets.

“We have seen quite a few tenders recently where public sector departments are requesting maintenance on EOL’d Cisco products. In these cases, the resellers are stuck. They cannot buy brand new expensive equipment to support old infrastructure; and they can no longer purchase these old products from the channel. The solution: they sign a back-to-back maintenance agreement with us. We hold the spares, and they call-off when a product goes faulty. SmartCare enables Cisco partners to support these customers without a costly purchase,” Holt explains

Legacy Cisco networks still have significant value to offer, and with the right support model, they can continue to function for years beyond OEM life cycle limits. SmartCare empowers companies to sweat their assets confidently, and gives resellers an affordable solution to offer hardware support on EOS and EOL’d equipment

As Holt summarises: “SmartCare takes over when Cisco no longer offers support. It provides an invaluable service to end-users and resellers who have, and need to maintain, older yet functioning Cisco networks. SmartCare offers the assurance that in the event of hardware failure, there will be the same part number delivered on site the next business day.”