networkZONE Products for the week of August 5, 2002
LVL7 Systems Says . . .
Platform Independence - LVL7's FASTPATH 3.0 Software
Supports More NP's. Open Architecture Lets Designers Adapt It To The Chip
Of Their Choice
New software product enables quick time to market for Gigabit
Ethernet products, opens the door to additional application services for
Enterprise, Access and Metro markets
LVL7 Systems introduced FASTPATH 3.0, an award-winning software product
that gives networking equipment vendors more flexibility, independence and
opportunity than ever before. Using LVL7's flexible and portable software
for network processors and ASIC/ASSPs, customers can deploy high function
networking products that are scalable from Gigabit Ethernet to over 10Gbps.
FASTPATH 3.0, recognized at this year's NetWorld + Interop conference as the industry's best embedded networking technology product, represents a significant advance in network processing software by delivering new functionality that dramatically reduces development costs and time to market.
Notable features include:
The introduction of LVL7's new MasterDriver, providing Hardware API's
that
allow customers to easily port FASTPATH 3.0 to ANY networking silicon. This
takes the concept of silicon independence to new levels, allowing customers
to adopt next generation technologies with a single software source. The
MasterDriver extends the work LVL7 has already done to integrate its software
with leading networking IC's from AMCC, Intel, Marvell, SwitchCore and Vitesse.
FASTPATH 3.0 is also operating system independent and has been tested on
and ported to VxWorks and Linux.
The addition of advanced services incorporating Quality of Service (QoS), Multicast and BGP-4 software suites allow equipment vendors to readily support emerging technology services such as video on demand and bandwidth provisioning. By enabling customers to plug-in new services to the FASTPATH architecture, LVL7 opens the door to new application services and revenue streams that utilize their existing infrastructure.
The breadth of applications and protocols available in FASTPATH 3.0 make it the most comprehensive and functional software offering on the market.
By delivering a system architecture including software from low-level device drivers to Layer 2 Switching / Layer 3 Routing / Layer 4+ applications and protocols in a single, turnkey package, FASTPATH 3.0 simplifies the software challenges associated with network equipment development and eliminates the need to integrate multiple shrink-wrap protocols.
"Our customers are looking for two specific qualities in a software solution: quick, seamless integration with their chosen operating system and silicon technology and the ability to plug-in advanced services that provide new revenue streams. With the release of FASTPATH 3.0, LVL7 delivers on both counts," said Ernie Baker, president of LVL7.
Solutions For the Enterprise, Access and Metro Markets
Designed for equipment vendors developing switches, routers and appliances
for the enterprise, metro and access markets, FASTPATH 3.0 fills a growing
demand for service-enabling functionality required for today's networking
infrastructure market.
Initial product solutions include:
Desktop Gigabit Ethernet switches for enterprise markets
Gigabit line cards for service provider and enterprise chassis-based infrastructure
Layer 2 / Layer 3 Switch-Routers for enterprise and service provider edge
markets
Broadband access devices with enhanced Bandwidth Provisioning capabilities,
and
Networking appliances that integrate Layer 4+ applications, such as wireless
(for access points and base stations) and security (VPN) technologies.
With the Gigabit Ethernet market growing at a breakneck pace, FASTPATH 3.0 is designed to meet the specific needs of equipment vendors in this space. Dell'Oro Group, an analyst firm based in Redwood City, California, predicts the number of ports will grow from 9.8 million in 2002 to 17.07 million, or nearly double in 2003, and will reach 44.3 million ports by 2005. The total Ethernet port shipment is expected to increase to 252.2 million ports by 2005.
Fastpath 3.0 Market Trends
A look at growing market demands and current customer trends in the networking
industry demonstrates the value of FASTPATH 3.0:
Trend #1: Enterprise customers and service providers are facing intense pressure to cut costs, improve operational efficiency and increase application services. With customers relying on their current infrastructure to deliver higher functionality and more performance than ever before, the availability of plug-in services can extend the product lifecycle and increase operational efficiency. In addition to cutting development costs, FASTPATH 3.0 enables system vendors to develop new revenue generating services based on factors such as customer usage and service levels. Enterprise customers can deploy high performance applications at a lower cost, which improves operational efficiency.
Trend #2: The cost and complexity of software development is driving network equipment manufacturing companies to third-party software vendors. The outsourcing movement that began in the networking industry nearly 20 years ago is quickly penetrating the software market. In the Ethernet/IP market alone, LVL7 predicts the market for third-party software will increase tenfold by 2004, jumping from $126 million to $1.3 billion. With a comprehensive suite of Layer 2, Layer 3 and Layer 4+ applications and protocols, FASTPATH 3.0 offers a distinct advantage over individual, shrink-wrapped protocol products. In addition, FASTPATH eliminates the need for extensive in-house software integration and standard based protocol development, saving as much as $1.5 million in development costs and one year of precious product development time.
Trend #3: New networking products require a higher level of flexibility and independence. Equipment vendors are developing an increasing number of systems that incorporate multiple silicon technologies. And Linux continues to gain popularity among product developers. Those trends -- combined with the fact that vendors are outsourcing multiple pieces of the product development process -- have created the need for a functional software architecture that can bridge all of these disparate technologies. FASTPATH 3.0 can integrate with any silicon and run on any embedded operating system, giving vendors the ability to seamlessly adopt next generation technologies.
About FASTPATH 3.0 Software
FASTPATH 3.0 features advanced Layer 2 Switching, Layer 3 Routing; and Layer
4+ applications and protocols. Notable additions to the FASTPATH 3.0 product
include the introduction of QoS, Multicast, BGP-4 and other service-enabling
capabilities. With its advanced QoS package (including Bandwidth Provisioning,
DiffServ Support and Access Control Lists), FASTPATH 3.0 enables equipment
vendors to easily plug-in advanced voice, video and application services
that provide new sources of revenue.
FASTPATH is an independent and flexible embedded network software architecture that provides 90% of the code required to build an advanced networking infrastructure product. Representing 80 man years of development time and including more than 1.2 million lines of production quality code, FASTPATH runs across multiple embedded operating systems including VxWorks and Linux and is integrated with network processors, coprocessors and networking ASICs from leading merchant silicon providers including AMCC, Intel, Marvell, SwitchCore and Vitesse.
With an optimized software offering that is integrated with microcode
and device drivers for any networking silicon, FASTPATH successfully improves
operational efficiency for customers by reducing internal development costs
and improving time to performance.
analogZONE Says . . .
When I reviewed LVL7's FASTPATH 1.0 last November, I was impressed at how a single product could provide complete protocol stack solutions that would run equally well on RISC-based network processors (Vitesse), custom-architected network processors (AMCC/MCC), and the control processor that managed a custom IP switch ASIC (SwitchCore.) Nevertheless, some critics rightly pointed out that LVL7's product did not provide a complete solution (like the fine products from RadLAN) that went beyond the protocol stacks and dealt with the management and control of actual hardware in a given box or card.
Now, with the introduction of their more comprehensive FASTPATH 3.0 software, LVL7 allows its customers to avoid the usual headaches from multi-vendor solutions, and dramatically cuts the time required to integrate and debug a networking product design. The new package includes a much more complete suite of box (chassis-specific development) and system (configuration, management, protocol drivers) services. It provides Layer 2 switching, layer 3 routing, and layer 4 protocols (multicast, QoS, bandwidth provisioning) XML, security, etc. The package is fairly complete, and most times you can get all the functionality you need with the simple addition of an OS (typically VX Works or Linux 3.1.)
If you're going to be using an AMCC, Vitesse, SwitchCore, chip, you'll get optimized control plane and with data plane code. Unlike some other vendors, both source and binary code is provided, allowing you to do your own debug, maintenance, and upgrades without relying on the code vendor. Support for Marvell's Prestera MX and EX chipsets is coming soon (this fall), and LVL7 is working with Intel to bundle its software into Intel's IXE switch family development environment around the same time.
LVl7 has every right to be proud of its Master Driver, which started off as an internal tool that LVL7 used to port their S/W to 9 different chips this past year. It is a clever software shim that sits between FastPath and the target device and lets you add their protocol support, management, and all fast path functionality to any ASIC or NP. It consists of device API (DAPI) and hardware API (HAPI.) HAPI is the silicon-specific layer that is modified by the user to map commands and functionality to a specific architecture. HAPI is hand-coded using LVL7 guidelines to ensure high efficiency. Templates, examples, and documentation suite allow the process to be as painless as possible. The package also includes training of your developers - usually only 2 days are required.
Using Master Driver allows you to do the magic once and re-use the effort with multiple customers and multiple applications. This should allow you to get stuff to market fast with minimum development costs so you can enjoy the up side of the development curve.
Once you have your silicon mapped into Master Driver,
you can accelerate your development efforts using the detailed reference
designs and suites available for many applications including Enterprise,
Access, Wireless, and Appliances. The enterprise reference design provides
a full-featured Gigabit desktop solution (l2/l3), as well as a lightly managed
solution. Their canned access solution supplies bandwidth allocation provisioning
suite for MTU/MCU applications, plus billing capability. The same solution
allows designers to address Fast/Gigabit Ethernet line card management for
access equipment. LVL7's wireless solution is expected to find homes in
base stations and WLAN access points.
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