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Juniper teams up with Polycom – Cisco in the crosshairs?

Tony Chan | January 26, 2010 | 0 Comments

Juniper Networks and Polycom has announced an alliance focused on improving the reliability, cost-effectiveness and quality of the customers experience for telepresence (with a small ‘t’) and video conferencing services.

The two companies don’t say it in so many words, but obviously have some synergies in such a tie up, since both count Cisco as the main rival in many of their respective markets – Juniper in the network equipment space and Polycom in telepresence.

Such an alliance now gives both companies some cross-selling of services, and presents a unified front against Cisco’s increasing dominance in the visual communications market, especially following its acquisition of conferencing big name – Tandberg.

The alliance that Juniper and Polycom will embark on will essentially join technology from the two companies to present a new managed video communications system for service providers and enterprises.

According to Juniper and Polycom, the alliance will be anchored by the dynamic signaling between Juniper’s network resource control platform and the Polycom video call control system, which now brings to market a joint managed video services solution that will reduce total capital expense and ongoing operating and maintenance costs and requirements, while improving the delivery and manageability of visual communications.

Specifically, the solution includes the Junos Space network application platform and its subscriber suite that includes policy and identity services, the MX Series 3D Universal Edge Routers, and SRX Series Services Gateways with integrated routing and security for streamlined enterprise connectivity. Key Polycom components include Polycom telepresence systems and visual communication infrastructure products, including the Polycom Distributed Media Application (DMA) that centralizes call control and provides further failover redundancy.

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The combination of the Junos Space network resource orchestration, real-time interactions between its policy and identity services, and the Junos operating system, with the Polycom DMA call control server enables a dynamic coordinated allocation of video and network resources, driven by user video session needs, the companies said. “This allows service providers to more accurately control and deliver video quality of service on a converged network shared with other applications. By maximizing their network capabilities and value, carriers can scale their networks more cost-effectively and realize higher margins for services.”

The new joint solution is due out in mid-2010 and will deliver an intelligent service provider solution that enables assured-quality managed video services over a converged network. The companies claims it will be the first “conferencing-awareP network solution. According to the firms, implementing a single-network solution is a significantly more scalable and profitable model for service providers compared to the current overlay network model for supporting telepresence and video conferencing services.

The new solution will also benefit enterprise looking to roll out their own video communications services on their own.

“The exploding interest in visual communication has created an urgent need for a more reliable and cost-effective model for delivering assured quality video services,” said Gerri Elliott, executive vice president for strategic alliances, Juniper Networks. “Leveraging Junos Space, an open platform for ecosystem partners, Juniper and Polycom are creating a unique solution that will enable carriers to maximize the value of their existing networks to deliver scalable, high quality video services. This will help carriers to move away from siloed networks toward more intelligent and efficient converged networks that are more sustainable and profitable in the long-term.”

Bob Hagerty, CEO, Polycom added: “Teaming with Juniper, our goal is to help improve the quality and efficiency of visual communications on the network, so customers have deployment options and can confidently incorporate the technology into their core business processes and as a key component of their unified communications initiatives. This partnership supports the Polycom Open Collaboration Network initiative, enabling more efficient and cost-effective delivery of Polycom’s open, standards-based solutions within a service model.”

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