The Lippis Report Podcast

Unified Communications (UC) suppliers have been busy extending their software to work on mobile endpoints, such as the Apple Iphone, blackberry, smartphones etc. But there has been little focus on solutions that extend UC to address in-building roaming applications. This is a huge area that has been overlooked with requirements in nearly every industry such as gaming, education, retail, financial services, transportation, etc. Most business and IT leaders look toward a few technologies to solve the in-building UC roaming problem including Voice Over WLAN, IP DECT, Dual Mode endpoints, reliance on the cellular network and, in the extreme, deploying their own cellular antenna to improve coverage. To sort this all out, I invited Shane Yu Director of Unified Communications Consulting at Avaya where weâll review these options and provide guidance as to which approach may work best for your corporation. If youâre looking to extend UC to in-building nomads, then you need to listen to this podcast

Mr. Michael Whaley, Network Engineering Specialist at American Century Investments is my quest as we discuss American Century Investmentâs teleworking strategy and solution. American Century Investments was looking to reduce the operational burden of supporting a large teleworking population while delivering an office IT experience to those working from home. Mr. Whaley describes how American Century Investments paid for a new teleworking solution with wide area facilities cost savings while increasing security, employee productivity and reducing IT managementâs operational spend. Itâs a fascinating podcast, if youâre developing a teleworking plan, then you need to listen in.

Mindwave Research recently changed its operational model to reduce facilities cost, improve productivity, gain access to a broader labor pool, increase customer service and be a greener company. At the heart of this operational change was the shift toward teleworking. By deploying a teleworker solution, Mindwave reduced its facilities cost by over 80%. They are leveraging IM, video conferencing and other unified communication services to keep employees connected and working together while they telecommute. Jason Snook, IT Director at Mindwave is my quest as he discusses the realized increased productivity and drastic reduction in commute travel time and CO2 emissions its employees would otherwise emit into the atmosphere.

Working from home has always been a different IT experience then being in the office. Home connectivity was restricted to dial-in, VPN or client based solutions with voice service usually being the house phone. This poor experience dampened the growth of teleworking, which was good news for most IT leaders as their concerns were security vulnerabilities and management. But with advanced integration of networks and communications in a small appliance the gap between office and home IT experience is closing fast. A confluence of factors ranging from green initiatives, to governmental requirements, work-home life style changes, business expense controls and new teleworking solutions are giving business and IT leaders the motivation to embrace and massively deploy teleworking solutions. Mr. Calvin Chai, Senior Marketing Executive at Cisco is my guest as we discuss Ciscoâs new Cisco Virtual Office offering; a teleworking solution that can be deployed in scale.

Teleworking with unified communications is now a major contributor to green initiatives. The thinking is simple, reduce the amount of cars commuting and carbon emissions will decline. On average there are 0.45 Tons of CO2 emitted into the atmosphere for every 1,000 miles driven while a typical commuter travels 7,000 miles per year. Assuming that in the US telecommuters work at home at least one day a week results is some 22.6 million Tons of CO2 that will not be emitted into the atmosphere. Thatâs just in the US and other countries are more aggressive in their telecommuting initiatives. But to make telecommuting realistic it needs to support multiple endpoints, communication services and all of the conveniences of enterprise communication systems including presence, directory, the corporate dial plan, etc. Combining unified communications with teleworking is delivering on this level of usefulness. Andrey Kuzyk, Senior Marketing Manager Unified Communications at Avaya joins me to discuss teleworking solutions, which helps to support a greener corporation.

Voice recording in branch offices and retail stores are becoming mandatory requirements as executive management seeks to capture customer interactions to better understand and optimize customer and market dynamics. Also new and stricter regulations for financial organizations are driving the need to record customer interactions at the branch level. NICE Systems has teamed up with Cisco Systems to deliver their Network Embedded VoIP logger on top of Ciscoâs AXP or Application eXtension Platform, which resides within its Integrated Services Router (ISR). In this podcast I talk with Nadav Doron Director of Branch Solutions for NICE Systems about the AXP as a development platform, the business value it creates and branch optimization realized. If you have voice recording requirements in your branch offices, then you need to listen to this podcast.

Luis Suarez Director of IT at H.I.G. Capital is my guest as we talk about how H.I.G created value and optimized its remote office operations through a new Cisco business platform, which tightly links applications and networks. In previous Lippis Report podcasts we reviewed Ciscoâs ISR-based Application eXtension Platform or AXP. Here Luis explains how HIG used AXP along with Sagem-Interstarâs XMediusFAX application to displace both an old world analog fax network plus web based fax services, while integrating fax services into UC extending it to all H.I.G endpoints and in the process speeding up business process and deal flow. If you are looking to reduce TCO and simplify fax services by integrating it into a UC environment, then you have to listen to this podcast.

Cisco is delivering a networked based application development platform within its Integrated Services Router (ISR) called AXP or Application eXtension Platform. Cisco created a technical and business architecture around AXP to foster an ecosystem of partners. The fact that there are millions of Cisco ISRs in production makes this approach compelling for partners. One Cisco partner is Sagem-Interstar, the global leader in advanced fax server solutions for IP networks. Sagem deploy its XMediusFAX FoIP technology on Ciscoâs AXP to virtualize fax functions into the Cisco ISR VoIP gateway. Shashi Kiran Senior Manager Network Systems Solutions Marketing for Cisco Systems and Christian Larocque, Director for Sagem-Interstar are my guest as we discuss the AXP as a development platform; the business value it creates and branch optimization realized. If youâre looking to optimize your branch office network, then you need to listen to this podcast

Todayâs knee jerk approach of stacking multiple vendor best-of-breed appliances to address specific threats increases security plus compliance vulnerabilities, operational cost and lowers application performance. Security appliances usually have their own management interfaces and performance parameters driving cost and complexity up. Thereâs another approach. Crossbeam transforms the way enterprises, service providers and government agencies architect and deliver security services. Its Next Generation Security Platform facilitates the consolidation, virtualization and simplification of security services delivery, while preserving the choice of best-of-breed security applications. Crossbeamâs security platform delivers quantifiable value on multiple fronts. In this podcast I talk with Pete Fiore, CEO of Crossbeam Systems about Crossbeanâs approach to IT security threat mitigation. If you have a perimeter defense in place then you need to listen to this podcast

The NAC market is at a pivot point as a key piece of technology that offers a third deployment option is about to enter the market. This third option, based upon authentication and distribution of NAC functions across existing appliances and network infrastructure will enable NAC to scale across an enterprise from its early deployments of guest, wireless and remote access to headquarter and campus LAN environments. Most NAC appliance supports two deployment modes today, in-band and out-of-band. In-band for small deployments and out-of -band for larger ones. Combining NAC appliance for assessing device posture and a Radius server system for 802.1x authentication, a third deployment option that glues together NAC appliances and NAC infrastructure is enabled to deploy NAC and 802.1X authentication is large campus LAN environments. Steven Song, Marketing Manager for Cisco Systems joins me to discuss NAC and how its maturing to the point that campus LANs are now being equipped with its defense mitigation protection capabilities.

The networking industry has started to open up its software in the form of SDKs and APIs. Cisco, Juniper, Extreme, 3Com and the open source routing initiatives are allowing developers to write to well defined router software interfaces. This is an important development as it provides a venue for increased innovation in networking. But Cisco has taken this activity to a higher level by offering Linux and Windows platforms within its Integrated Services Router (ISR) and Wide Area Application Services (WAAS) products, delivering on the network as a platform concept. We focus on the ISR-based solution today as I talk with Shashi Kiran, Senior Manager Network Systems for Cisco Systems. We discuss this new trend in IT which takes integrated networking to the next level by integrating computing and applications in to the network fabric offering business and IT leaders a new approach to branch office value creation with the Application eXtension Platform. If youâre designing new applications for, or optimizing branch office operations then you need to listen to this podcast.

aCerno is a company that serves online ads at sub-millisecond speeds. It uses anonymous shopping data from a group of over 450 multichannel retailers to predict which products of more than 140 million online consumers will be likely to purchase. aCerno reaches nearly all online shoppers and processes over a couple billion queries per day. From the time of the query to the time an ad is served has to be 150 milliseconds or less. Foundry Networks' equipment makes that possible. Wayne Earl, Director of Network Operations at aCerno is my guest as we explore aCerno's IT infrastructure that allows it to deliver a fantastic service to its customers with very strict time constraints. If you're looking to increase application performance then you need to listen to this podcast.

We all have multiple workspaces where we deliver value to our corporations. Workspaces span from your office to your home and every place in-between. The devices we use may be desktop and laptop computers, fixed, mobile and soft phones. The bottom line is that our communications conveniences that being directory, presence, messaging, call logs, click-to-call, click-to-conference, etc should be extended across all these workspaces. The question we ask in this podcast is can a workspace ready network be implemented with different network and communications suppliers or are their compelling attributes to build workspace ready network with a single vendor? Sanket Amberkar, Manager Solutions Marketing of Network Systems & Security for Cisco Systems is my guest as we discuss workspace ready networks and how they increase corporate value while simultaneously reducing IT operational cost. If youâre planning a UC deployment then you need to listen to this podcast.

Itâs a fact that the global economy has slowed prompting contact center managers and IT leaders to explore strategies for maintaining efficiency and meeting revenue targets with fewer resources and constrained budgets. But within a contact center environment, there are many opportunities, sometime hidden, to actually maximize efficiency and still control and possibly reduce costs. With an expert, holistic examination of operations and identification of areas of improvement, management can be proactive in identifying and implementing strategies that not only help their businesses navigate through a potential economic downturn, but accomplish business results that remain beneficial after the economy recovers. Eddie Jenkins, Vice President, Customer Service Practice for the Professional Services business at Avaya joins me to discuss leveraging contact centers for strategic corporate value, which means increasing revenues, corporate productivity and gaining market share during down markets. This is a very timely podcast chocked full of great ideas to be successful in a down market.

According to industry sources âThe average corporation under budgets PCI (Payment Card Industry Compliance) by 40%. Any company, mom and pop shops to fortune 50 corporation that processes credit card information need to be PCI compliant. Penalties for non-compliance are severe and are enforced by the banks such as Visa, MasterCard, American Express and others through fees plus increases in transaction cost. For the mid market, a doubling of the transaction fee charge will have a much larger impact on its cost to productivity. Terry Quinn-Andry, Compliance Solutions Manager for Cisco Systems joins me to discuss PCI requirements for mid market corporation. Weâll explain PCI benefits, exposure of non-compliance and how to avoid penalties. If youâre responsible for PCI compliance, then you need to listen to this podcast

With the slow down in the global economy we ask the question; how is this business cycle impacting IT and communications? During down markets cost reduction initiatives are obviously important, but so too is service creation as corporations respond and react to new market realities. One major difference in this down cycle from others is the fact that many firms are in the middle of a communications infrastructure upgrade cycle. Traditional TDM PBXs are reaching the end of their economic and reliability lifecycles. Most enterprises are either in the middle of or have migration plans to move to IP telephony platforms, implementation of Unified Communication applications, and the upgrading of Call Centers to Contact Centers. Given the state of this communications technology migration, IT organizations will find it even more difficult to manage the inevitable downturn in spending and tightening of resources to accomplish their missions. Ajay Kapoor, Director of Consulting and Systems Integration for Enterprise Communications for Avaya is my guest as we offer several actions that IT leaders can take immediately that help IT increase efficiency while reducing costs within 12 months. This is a great IT management podcast that business and IT leaders will find valuable and timely.

Data centers are the largest single IT investment CIOs and business leaders appropriate. Data center networking is leading edge by default and where high-speed links and new approaches are first deployed. While data centers are consolidating and becoming increasingly virtualized, networking requirements are fundamentally changing. High performance end-of-row and top-of-rack network switches are uniquely positioned to increase network throughput and reduce operational spend. I talk with Doug Murray VP/GM of Extreme Networks about new data center design options thanks to its Summit X650 high end Ethernet switch. If youâre designing a data center network, then you need to listen to this podcast

The conventional wisdom in IT threat mitigation is to build a layered defense with security technology such as firewalls, IPS, network access control, anti-x client software, alarm aggregation and event correlation, etc. Conventional wisdom is starting to shift toward a systems approach to protecting IT assets. The layered approach was built upon deploying best of breed products, which were best of breed only until other products emerged and relegated them to either standalone appliances and/or loosely coupled silos such as the linking between IPS and firewalls. The systems approach builds upon IT security investment by wrapping it with System Management for policy, reputation and identity that transcending endpoints, networks, content and application security. Fred Kost, Ciscoâs Director Security Marketing is my guest as we explain the new IT security model and provide IT leaders with guidance on building a more secure IT infrastructure. To understand the systems approach to IT security then listens to this podcast:

Scott Lucas, Senior Director of Solutions Marketing for Extreme Networks is my guest as we discuss Extreme Networks major product portfolio expansion and the launch of its widget central. Extreme launched its new Summit X350 fixed configuration switch for network edge applications plus 802.11n access points and controllers. A new version of ExtremeXOS with enhanced automation capabilities to help IT leaders reduce operational spend is now available too. Extending the usefulness of its flagship BlackDiamond 8800, it launched the âCâ Series of core switch interface and management blades for increased scalability and density of 1GbE and 10GbE ports plus PoE support. Extreme has created an ecosystem around the development of application Widgets by exposing features and providing software developers access to its ExtremeXOS. This ecosystem is called Widget Central. I talk with Scott about the new design options and widgets available to network architects afforded by this launch.

TCO or total cost of ownership is always a difficult metric to measure. So many business and IT leaders focus on purchase price or product acquisition without giving full attention to operational and facilities cost, which dominate network TCO. Conventional wisdom is that for LAN and WLAN switching acquisition cost represents between 20 to 25% of TCO with operational and facilities spend represents between 75 to 80% over a 3-year period. So the question is what can IT leaders do to optimize TCO and bring balance to network acquisition and operations. Scott Lucas, Senior Director of Solutions Marketing for Extreme Networks is my guest as we discuss best practices to balance TCO.

Marcus Bost, Chief Information Officer, Adena Health System is my guest as we discuss how Adena is using IP Video to provide neonatal care to its patients in southern Ohio linked to the largest US Neonatology center at Nationwide Childrenâs Hospital 70 miles away. Adena pediatricians are now able to collaborate with Nationwide Childrenâs neonatology experts in full high definition real time IP video to assess and diagnose infants, review CT scans, X-rays and consult with Adena pediatricians on treatment plans. Mr. Bost discusses the above project from both a human condition improvement and economic perspective. We end the talk with a discussion on network readiness and future IP video plans at Adena Health System. If youâre developing an IP Video plan then you need to listen to this podcast.

Many IT leaders have build private application delivery networks while outsourcing content delivery network needs to improve the performance of video, music downloads, and rich media. These two separate networks are now converging into one physical but logically separate networks with unique attributes for the traffic, which flows through them. Two experts in the field from Internap; Phil Kaplan Chief Strategy Officer and Tim Sullivan Chief Technology Officer join me to discuss how these two network clouds are beginning to drift together and what this will mean to IT operations and business. Internapâs approach to service delivery is software based and relies upon backbone router vendors such as Foundry Networkâs NetIron XMR and its ServerIron to deliver the services it offers. If you have built an application delivery network and outsource content delivery to a service provider then you need to listen to this podcast.

IP video is being massively consumed in the consumer and corporate markets. In 2007 IP video exceeded the total sum of 2000 internet traffic which was nearly 25 Petabytes/month while IDC estimates that corporate video traffic will more then double in the next two years with greater then half of all corporations currently using some form of IP video. IP video is either deployed from the bottom up or top down. Click-to-conference plus enterprise based Web 2.0 social networking and collaboration initiatives are deployed from the bottom up while video surveillance, digital signage, TelePresence, and one-to-many for training and executive-to-employee briefings broadcast are top down. In short, business and IT leaders will not have total control over IP video deployments and are advised to prepare your networks for IP video. Kumar Srikantan Senior Director of Ciscoâs Campus Switching Systems Technology Group joins me to discuss best practices to guide IT leaders to prepare their networks in support of IP video services. If your corporation is using IP video, then you need to listen to this podcast.

With every IT paradigm transition comes not only increased bandwidth requirements, but an increased reliance on network services such as security, remote VPN access, QoS, and application classification to support a wide variety of corporate applications. Also new WAN services such as Metro Ethernet and 3G wireless are redefining WAN design. Between these demanding new applications and WAN options, lies the aggregation router, which has been primarily a narrowband device connecting sites via Frame Relay and MPLS, and thus has presented a bottleneck to new real-time collaboration technologies. This is all about to change, because a new era of WAN design has emerged. New router platforms are rare as their life-cycle is usually greater then a decade. So when one is announced itâs the beginning of a long industry cycle and when itâs Cisco whoâs making the announcement you know that itâs an industry-changing event. Cisco has announced its Aggregation Services Router, or ASR, 1000 Series, which is focused on the high-end enterprise WAN and service provider edges. The ASR value proposition is rooted in a reduction of appliance hardware, lower WAN cost through aggregation and lower operational spend thanks to management break-throughs. Marie Hattar, Senior Director of Network Systems and Security solutions marketing at Cisco Systems is my guest as we dive into the ASR and new WAN design options it enables. To get the cost out and performance into your WAN, listen to this podcast

802.11n offers impressive improvements in rate, range, and price/ performance thanks to significantly higher processing and power consumption than older WLAN Access Points (APs). A key question in the decision to deploy 802.11n APs is whether there is enough power delivered over 802.3af Power over Ethernet (PoE) switch ports or compliant power injectors to run these APs as 802.11nâs increased bandwidth and processing may require more then the 12.95 Watts provided in 802.3af switch ports. I interview Craig Mathias, a Principal at Farpoint Group and author of the recent report â802.11n Access Points and Power over Ethernet: Key Considerationsâ and Luc Roy VP of Enterprise Mobility at Siemens Enterprise Communications which is shipping an 802.11n AP that operates with 802.3af PoE. Craig tested the Siemens AP3620 802.11n APs and shares its results. If youâre planning on deploying 802.11n then you need to listen to this podcast.

The Kent School District is the fourth largest school in the state of Washington comprised of four high schools, six middle schools, 28 elementary schools and two academies with nearly 27,000 students and 3200 employees. Kentâs IT staff were challenged to support a doubling of networked computers, new IT service requirements including virtualized desktops, smart boards, video surveillance and unified communications all while keeping their operational budget constant. Kent under went a district-wide network refresh, where the IT team sought to replace the current edge network that included products from ProCurve Networking by HP and 3Com for Cisco. I talk with Thuan Nguyen, Director of IT at Kent School District about his options, decisions and results. Itâs a fascinating case of what can be done in IT today.

Wiring closet switches are undergoing a renaissance of sorts. Once thought of as simple network connectivity devices, they are now central to network security, mobility, PoE distribution, IP phone and UC connection devices etc. Wiring closet switches are pervasive as they connect all end points into an enterprise network distributing network services throughout a corporation. TCO of these switches breakdown as 20/80% capital/operational spend resulting in switch design, network management plus reliability and serviceability features possessing a demonstrable effect toward lowering TCO. I talk with Ish Limkakeng Senior Director of Marketing for the Desktop Switching unit at Cisco Systems about wiring closet switches and the new basis of competition and buying criteria that has emerged.

Retail business executives are measured on customer experience, revenue and productivity. Retail IT executives are expected to lower TCO while being integral to addressing the most pressing retail issues; that being customer brand loyalty and creating an environment which delivers an excellent experience. The communications industry is driving new value in retail stores with what I call Retail Store 2.0 (RS 2.0). RS 2.0 addresses retail executive concerns including creating brand loyalty, delivering good to excellent service, lowing TCO, simplifying communications, and delivering improved visibility, security and control of communications. Bruce Mazza, Director of Branch Solutions and Leslie Levy, Senior Manager of Retail Solutions both from Avaya discuss value creation in retail and multi-site environments through Intelligent Store Architecture. If youâre seeking to deliver a better retail store experience and drive revenue up then you have to listen to this podcast.

This is the year of the Branch Office. Business and IT leaders are re-distributing corporate assets and allocating significant investments in data center and branch office assets. There is strong business, economic, demographic and technical driversâ shaping this trend. The IT industry has responded by offering many new network design options to business and IT leaders who seek to add value to their branch offices. In this podcast I discuss this global trend with Inbar Lasser-Raab Senior Director of Marketing for Enterprise Routing and Switching at Cisco as we dive into the details of Ciscoâs latest branch office innovations. If adding value to your branch offices is a corporate initiative, then you need to listen to this podcast

Siemens Communications made the largest Unified Communications (UC) announcement of the year by launching OpenScape UC Server and a suite of UC applications. This is a huge software investment from Siemens taking one of, if not the, largest steps of any in the industry toward a software and services concern. Siemens is offering innovative UC software based upon open communications architecture while rooted in enterprise class voice communications capabilities. I discuss this announcement, industry dynamics, Siemensâ relationships with Microsoft, IBM et al with Siemensâ Mark Straton, SVP Global Marketing and Interpreet Singh, Director of Emerging Technologies. If youâre planning a UC project, then you have to listen to this podcast