When you look closer into Cisco network systems products, you find components that are industry leaders in their own right. Cisco provides one of the most robust, intelligent lines of integrated services routers, along with one of the most comprehensive, feature-rich portfolios of network switches.

Routing

Cisco routers allow organizations to build a foundation for an intelligent, self-defending network, featuring best-in-class security services and routing technologies for a low total cost of ownership and a high return on investment. These routers offer:
• Industry-leading services densities, bandwidth, availability, and performance options for maximum configuration flexibility and scalability for the most demanding networking environments

• Superior services performance and investment protection

• An integrated systems approach to embedded services that speeds application deployment and reduces operating costs and complexity

For the branch, Cisco provides a portfolio of routers designed for secure wire-speed delivery of concurrent wireless, data, voice, and video services with superior investment protection. Cisco integrated services routers embed security, mobility, LAN switching, and voice services inside the router as a single resilient system for ease of deployment, simplified management, and lower operating costs. They also support leading-edge WAN technologies, such as:
• Optimized Edge Routing (OER), which helps enable intelligent network-traffic load distribution and dynamic failure detection of data paths at the WAN edge

• Group Encrypted Transport (GET) VPNs, a highly-scalable, tunnelless form of virtual private networking

• Wide-Area Application Services (WAAS), which combine application acceleration technologies with WAN optimization techniques

In addition to convenience, the Cisco integrated services routers provide investment protection. The integrated design enables a 70 percent reduction in operational expenses when compared to deploying multiple overlaid components in a branch to achieve the same services. Additionally, the modular design of the Cisco integrated services routers allows for easy integration of new services as well as the expansion of existing ones.
At the headend, Cisco offers an extensive WAN and MAN aggregation platform portfolio, which also provides a comprehensive set of highly secure, concurrent, and integrated services. Cisco services aggregation routers provide exceptional performance with aggregation speeds of up to 2 Mpps and support for as many as 16,000 Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) sessions and 5000 VPN sessions per chassis. For optimization, these routers also support Network-Based Application Recognition for application optimization and OER. To help ensure the security of your network, these routers include support for IP Security (IPsec) encryption, an integrated stateful firewall, and support for identity-based access control.
Switching

Cisco offers a comprehensive portfolio of intelligent network switches, with a continuously expanding suite of intelligent services and advanced technologies to strengthen, simplify, and extend the value of the network infrastructure. As a leader in switching technology innovation, Cisco is constantly developing new ways to enable its customers to get more from their network infrastructure. Many Cisco innovations have evolved into industry standards, including Cisco EtherChannel