SCIENCE

BOSTON, MA -- Nortel Networks (NYSE:NT)(TSE:NT.) has expanded its reseller agreement with IBM Global Services, enabling the world's largest information technology services provider to deliver Nortel Networks end-to-end intelligent optical networking solutions for cost-effective management of high bandwidth applications to enterprises and carriers worldwide. Already a "Nortel Networks Global Solutions Partner," IBM has added Nortel Networks OPTera Metro 3500, 5200 and 5300 Multiservice Platforms; Nortel Networks Alteon Web switches; and Nortel Networks Shasta 5000 Broadband Service Node (BSN) to its comprehensive solution set. IBM Global Services will provide end-to-end support for these products - including consulting, implementation, and post-sale support - for enterprise customers worldwide. "This next step in our relationship with IBM allows us to build integrated communications solutions that leverage Nortel Networks optical expertise and IBM's eBusiness leadership," said Peter Evans, Metro Optical Solutions, Nortel Networks. "Together, we are positioning our service provider and enterprise customers for new levels of profitability, and reducing the metropolitan networking bottleneck to make cost-effective services a reality." "Nortel Networks OPTera Metro DWDM (dense wavelength division multiplexing) products have been tested and fully qualified by IBM, and provide a key underpinning to our GDPS (Geographically Dispersed Parallel Sysplex) environment," said Rich Lechner, vice president, marketing, IBM eServer zSeries. "Solutions like OPTera help our customers meet the high-speed, high-availability requirements of today's e-infrastructures." The expanded reseller agreement extends a relationship between the two companies involving the IBM Fiber Saver 2029, which was built by Nortel Networks for IBM in 1999. Fiber Saver 2029 was the first enterprise-ready optical connectivity solution designed to provide mainframe customers with high-speed, reliable data transfer at low cost. It is a proven technology and a key component of IBM's GDPS environment, which provides exceptional application availability and near-transparent disaster recovery across multiple data centers over a metropolitan area network. A cost-effective, metro DWDM platform designed for enterprises and customer premises, Nortel Networks OPTera Metro 5300 comes in a customized package - already mounted, tested and configured - to enable fast, easy deployment. Like Fiber Saver 2029, it addresses demand for high-speed I/O, network connections, and data transfer for customers with multiple servers in different locations, as well as enterprise customers who need continuous access to data and applications including eBusiness, business intelligence and disaster recovery solutions. In addition, OPTera Metro 5300 will provide optical amplifiers, SONET protocols, and new network topology options. Nortel Networks Alteon Web switches provide intelligence, scalability and high availability to IP-based networks. Alteon Web switches rely on higher-level network traffic management functions based on IP packet inspection at Layers 4-7, enabling identification of users and content. Because Alteon Web switches are content aware, they are able to determine the best means of matching users with requested content quickly and reliably across the network. Nortel Networks Shasta 5000 BSN positions service providers to offer profitable new value-added services. Shasta 5000 BSN delivers a variety of broadband service deployment capabilities, and offers customers the ability to provide scalable, mass-market, managed services. It supports personalized portals, giving subscribers only the services and content they want. It also provides managed firewalls, Quality of Service (QoS) management, content filtering, and policy management. For more information visit www.nortelnetworks.com or www.ibm.com