SDD enhances reseller growth

Siltek Distribution Dynamics (SDD), a member of JSE-listed Siltek Limited, SA's largest Technology Supply Chain Group, is delivering the industry-standard Cisco Aironet 350 Series of 802.11b-compliant wireless local area networking (WLAN) products to its reseller base, so they can meet the growing demands by the corporate market for technology that enables a mobile workforce.

The Aironet 350 Series includes a new family of high-speed access points, bridges and client adapters. Using this new wireless networking technology based on Cisco's Architecture for Voice, Video and Integrated Data (AVVID), enterprises can provide mobile network access and increase employee productivity throughout the campus environment.

"Wireless networking is not so much a revolutionary technology as it is the natural progression of an entrenched technology that permeates every level of almost every single organisation in an IT-literate and dependent world today. With the sheer number of mobile devices already on the market, wireless networking cannot help but form a major portion of tomorrow's IT revenues," says Quintus Theron, product manager at SDD.

"The enterprise market wants a robust solution that provides end-to-end security, manageability and performance, all the requirements of hard-wired networks," he says.

Through the new Cisco Aironet wireless networking security framework, based upon the proposed IEEE 802.1x standard, enterprises can, for the first time, scale wireless deployments to thousands of users with a standard, centralised security management framework.

Theron adds: "Resellers that jump on the bandwagon today, acquiring or developing the skills they need to grow their client-base, and develop solutions and value-add that will give them a competitive advantage in a market with shrinking margins, will survive the natural evolution of the channel and grow beyond it in an online world.

"I'm already seeing a positive trend toward the adoption of wireless networking in the channel as a market growth medium for resellers. Those resellers that want to remain competitive must either join this trend or develop alternative lines of equally positive potential growth," says Theron.

"Critical to the adoption of WLAN solutions is the maturity and experience of traditional network equipment suppliers such as Cisco to meet enterprise customers' strict requirements, particularly in the area of security," says Theron. "This is one of the reasons we offer our resellers Cisco equipment, because it is an established networking solutions provider with all the partnerships and ongoing development to keep it there.

Enterprise-class security framework delivers scalable, centralised security management and supports dynamic single-session, single-user encryption keys integrated with network logon. 802.1x utilises standard security protocols such as RADIUS to provide centralised user identification, authentication, dynamic key management and accounting. RADIUS server support for the Cisco Aironet 350 Series has also been incorporated into the newest release of Cisco Secure Access Control Server (ACS) for Windows 2000 & NT version 2.6. It includes full support for user authentication of Aironet wireless clients and provides dynamic distribution of encryption keys to secure each connection. This dynamic allocation of encryption keys eliminates the burden of Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) key management, giving IT managers the confidence to deploy an enterprise-wide wireless solution for their users.

He adds: "Resellers that jump on the bandwagon today, acquiring or developing the skills they need to grow their client-base, and develop solutions and value-add that will give them a competitive advantage in a market with shrinking margins, will survive the natural evolution of the channel and grow beyond it in an online world.

"I'm already seeing a positive trend toward the adoption of wireless networking in the channel as a market growth medium for resellers. Those resellers that want to remain competitive must either join this trend or develop alternative lines of equally positive potential growth."

The Aironet 350 Series offers frequency agility, infrastructure-based load balancing, redundant hot standby and world mode functionality. To provide maximum range, the Aironet 350 client adapters access points and bridges feature 100 milliwatt (mW) transmit power. This higher-powered radio provides the largest coverage area available.

"Critical to the adoption of WLAN solutions is the maturity and experience of traditional network equipment suppliers such as Cisco to meet enterprise customers' strict requirements, particularly in the area of security," says Theron. "This is one of the reasons we offer our resellers Cisco equipment, because it is an established networking solutions provider with all the partnerships and ongoing development to keep it there.

The access points support in-line power over Ethernet, which simplifies and reduces the total cost of installation and operation. This line power configuration is compatible with the IEEE 802.3a draft standard and works with all Cisco devices enabled for line power such as Cisco Catalyst switches and line power patch panels.