HP adds voice to Cisco

Hewlett Packard and Cisco will co-develop voice and data products for internet service and telecoms providers, in an alliance that raises Cisco's credibility in the lucrative telecoms sector.

The two companies will jointly design a family of products called the Open Call Multiservice Controller, combining HP's intelligent networking software, Open Call, with Cisco's internetworking operating system (IOS) platform.

The idea is to replicate the services of traditional voice telephony on packet-based data networks, enabling carriers that sell IP telephony to continue offering voice services, such as freephone, without having to reprogram the entire infrastructure.

The partners are also working on a challenge many competitors are examining - internet call waiting, the ability to notify Web surfers of incoming phone calls.

Analysts applauded the partnership, which provides Cisco with a much-needed boost in its ambition to sell to ISPs and carriers against established telecoms giants Lucent Technologies and Nortel.

Apart from a few tactical buyouts of voice/data startups, Cisco has been without a partner in the voice sector, when compared with the alliances its data rivals Bay Networks and 3Com have made.

'HP plugs the gap,' said Neil Rickard, a research director with Gartner Group Europe. 'There is no reason why the partnership should not be long term since there are no external conflicts that would put stress on the relationship.'

HP's telecoms business unit develops voice-related systems for carriers.

Among its products is a call control package that helps determine where calls are routed within the telephone switch.

The Open Call Multiservice Controllers are expected in the first quarter of next year, initially supporting the HP/UX1 operating system, on the Cisco SC220 platform. Technology to enable traditional PSTN networks to merge with IP environments will appear by the second half of 1999.

Meanwhile, John Chambers, chief executive of Cisco, has dismissed a US government investigation into the firm as a 'small inquiry'.

At the US press conference announcing Cisco's alliance with HP, he told journalists: 'It has to do with transactions that were made six to 18 months ago, which I put on the front page of any paper that would listen.'

In June, the US Federal Trade Commission began investigations into whether Cisco tried to illegally carve up the network market with Nortel and Lucent.

While Cisco admitted it had held talks with the two firms about possible partnerships, it insisted there was nothing secretive or anti-competitive about the discussions.

Chambers added: 'It's more an issue of education in that area, because if you spend time with certain government agencies and politicians, people get to understand the issues.'