Cox Communications to date has rolled out more than 100 of Cisco Systems' Aggregation Services Router 9000 series routers as the foundation of its nationwide IP network, as the MSO prepares to handle a huge surge of online video in the years ahead.
Cisco's ASR 9000 are Ethernet routers designed to provide high capacity at the "edge" of the network. Also Tuesday, the vendor said it introduced a network virtualization technology, dubbed "nV," which kick up the platform's capacity 15-fold, to 96 Terabits per second -- enough bandwidth to download the equivalent of 180,000 DVDs every minute.
At Cox, for the most part, the ASR 9000s are replacing older Cisco 7609 routers, according to senior vice president of technology Jay Rolls.
"As Cox Communications continues to deliver innovative Internet-based video services to our customers, it is critical that our network has the power and scalability to facilitate the near- and long-term needs of our residential and business customers," Rolls said in a prepared statement. "The next-generation Internet is upon us, and the Cisco ASR 9000 will enable our world-class network to accommodate the sharp increase in video and online services we're seeing among our customers."
Video is on track to account for more than 50% of consumer Internet traffic by the end of next year and reach 62% by the end of 2015, according to Cisco's latest Visual Networking Index Forecast, issued last week.
Previously, Cisco announced Bright House Networks as among its initial ASR 9000 customers. Other service provider customers Cisco said are using the ASR 9000 include China Telecom, FastWeb, NTT-Plala and Tata Communications.
Also Tuesday, Cisco said it is introducing an Integrated Service Module (ISM) with the nV technology to provide what the vendor claimed is "carrier-grade IPv6" deployment across thousands of devices.
In addition, Cisco announced that it is expanding the ASR 9000 line with the ASR 9922 router and high-density 10G and 100G interfaces and the ASR 9000v for the network aggregation layer.
