Nitel Adds Cisco Routers in Network Upgrade

Nitel is upgrading its network to accommodate the Internet of Things (IoT) and other up-and-coming technologies.

The Chicago-based managed telecom service provider is adopting Cisco ASR 9900 routers into its points of presence. The company says this enhancement will better support IoT, cloud and mobility services.

Nitel’s Lawrence Edmond

Lawrence Edmond, Nitel’s senior vice president of network engineering, says Cisco gear has given Nitel the performance and scalability that customers demand.

“Cisco’s proven platform gives customers the foundation they need to advance their business by taking advantage of IoT, cloud and mobility solutions, as well as SD-WAN, SDN and network function virtualization,” he said.

Nitel cites an IDC study that shows IoT spending hitting $1.4 trillion by 2021, adopted strongly by the manufacturing, transportation, health-care and utility verticals. Edmond says Nitel partners have a great opportunity facing them in IoT.

“The projected growth in IoT spending places us at a critical point in the evolution of the network,” Edmond said. “Businesses will require a significant amount of bandwidth to support both their IoT-connected devices, alongside the growing number of cloud-based communications, collaboration and mobility applications their end-users have come to rely on.”

Nitel has enhanced its network to support speeds of 100Gbps on Internet ports and added SD-WAN and security offerings earlier this year. On the go-to-market side, it recently launched a new program for master agents and distributors.

“Nitel is providing the technical infrastructure, high-performance bandwidth and secure solutions channel partners need to confidently sell and support advanced and emerging cloud-based technologies,” Edmond said.

Taylor Castranova, Nitel’s vice president of channel sales and account development, says Nitel is continually investing in its network infrastructure.

“In a cloud-first marketplace, managed security and application performance are critically important. By upgrading our network, we’re enabling secure, scalable and reliable solutions that can support the most significant trends in IT, including cloud adoption and the Internet of things. SD-WAN is at the heart of what enterprises need to make sense of the mounting complexity of their environments and what channel partners are primed to deliver,” she said.

Castranova says Nitel is giving partners the training, education and enablement they need to bring SD-WAN to their customers.

“Partner enablement is a huge focus at Nitel,” she said. We want our consultative and collaborative approach to sales, along with our growing services portfolio, to always be among the top reasons partners choose Nitel.”