Company expands 40 gigabit Ethernet (40 GigE) capabilities throughout the network; collaboration with Citrix helps ensure an exceptional experience for workers with new applications and cloud services
Alcatel-Lucent announced a major upgrade of its award-winning data centre switching solution or 'fabric', the Alcatel-Lucent Mesh. By extending high-performance 40 gigabit Ethernet (40 GigE) links throughout the Mesh, the company has dramatically increased the speed, responsiveness and flexibility of enterprise data centre networks, making them better able to support bandwidth-devouring, real-time applications like video collaboration, virtual desktop, and the growing array of cloud services.
To complete the evolution to 40 GigE in the Mesh, Alcatel-Lucent has added 40 GigE capabilities to its OmniSwitch 10K Modular Ethernet LAN Chassis, a high-performance network core switch. This move – coupled with the use of a technique called 'Shortest Path Bridging' which optimises server-to-server communications across the entire Mesh - enables enterprises to essentially transform their data centre networks into private clouds, giving them the flexibility to reconfigure data centre resources quickly and easily.
To complement the 40 GigE enhancements, the Alcatel-Lucent Mesh has also been verified as Citrix Ready™. The Citrix Ready programme helps customers identify third-party solutions that are recommended to enhance networking and cloud computing solutions from Citrix, and ultimately provide a seamless experience for users. Alcatel-Lucent is collaborating with Citrix to support the growing demands of mobile workstyles, cloud services and the variety of new applications being delivered across enterprises wide area networks (WANs), and to support the introduction of virtualised desktops, that place a burden on the network and require a greater level of infrastructure support.
Klaus Oestermann, Group VP & GM Cloud Networking Group, Citrix said: "Networking infrastructure has taken centre stage as the unstoppable forces of mobility and cloud transform the demands of the data centre. With the Citrix cloud networking portfolio including NetScaler 10 and Branch Repeater 6 we are giving enterprises the same cloud platform capabilities to power their business that the largest public clouds have enjoyed for years. This is game changing, and we are excited to work with one of the world’s leading communications companies to usher in this new era. As a charter member of Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise’s ecosystem programme, we will be able to give our enterprise customers the confidence to deploy full interoperable Citrix Ready solutions."
Camille Janssens, ICT Director of DHL Express said: "The demand for more bandwidth is a constant challenge. New technology implementations like those from Alcatel-Lucent are delivering the ability to scale to faster speeds in the future while creating a highly reliable data centre capable of acting as a global hub."