NETWORKS

Force10 Networks today announced that it has expanded its presence in Europe and Asia with three new technical assistance centers (TACs) that will allow the company to better serve its rapidly expanding worldwide customer base. With new TACs in London, Tokyo and Chennai, India, Force10 is providing 24x7 service and support around the world. "Force10's success is due, in large part, to strong customer loyalty derived from leading technology and outstanding service and support both during product deployments and after," said Bahman Sohrabi, vice president of customer support at Force10 Networks. "These new centers extend our abilities to provide superior service and support in Europe and Asia at a time when our worldwide customer presence is rapidly growing." In Europe, Force10 has opened a technical assistance center in London, which is also home to one of Force10's European sales offices. The new TAC provides dedicated engineering support for Force10's growing European customer base. Recently, Force10 announced that CERN is deploying the TeraScale E-Series in Europe's largest campus network, which will connect more than 8,000 processors and storage devices. Additionally, CERN is leveraging the TeraScale E-Series to deploy the first intercontinental 10 Gigabit Ethernet WAN links in a production network. Other recent European deployments include Netherlands-based hosting provider True and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, Europe's largest supercomputer. To extend its investment in Asia, Force10 has opened service and support centers in Tokyo and Chennai, India. Both centers enable Force10 to better respond to the regional support needs of its significant Asian customer base. In Japan, Force10 counts as its customers nearly all of the leading Internet service providers in the country, including NTT-ME, BIGLOBE, Sakura Internet and Japan Cablenet. Additionally, high performance customers in Korea, such as the Korea Institute of Science and Information Technology Information (KISTI), rely on Force10 to provide a high level of service and support. With a recently announced win at Baidu.com, the sixth most visited website in the world, and a growing customer base throughout the area, regionally located service centers are critical to Force10's continued success in its existing Asian markets as well as new ones. The Force10 TeraScale E-Series leads the industry in density and resiliency. Supporting 1,260 Gigabit Ethernet and 56 line-rate 10 Gigabit Ethernet ports in a single system, the TeraScale E-Series provides the long-term scalability that enables seamless and cost-effective network expansion without disruption.