Lucent Technologies Inc., hoping to make sense out of the collection of VPN product offerings it acquired with Ascend Communications Inc. and Xedia Corp., on Monday debuted a virtual private network product strategy and several new products.
It also unveiled new low-end VPN hardware and software enhancements.
Lucent's Secure VPN portfolio is built on existing Lucent products, particularly its Customer Premises Equipment-based VPN routers, firewall-based VPN gateways, VPN clients and LSMS (Lucent Security Management Server) central security policy management software.
LSMS Version 5.0, introduced Monday, integrates the security software and Lucent's IP-Sec client with the Xedia Acess Point routers, which provide site-to-site VPN services at T-1 speeds. It also integrates the Ascend Pipeline and SuperPipe remote access routers.
Lucent expanded on that with a new release of the Pipeline and SuperPipe VPN software that adds support for standard Internet Key Exchange, X.509 Public Key Infrastructure and new user authentication features. In addition, LSMS version 5.0 adds security policy management to the Pipeline and SuperPipe product lines.
For small offices and road warriors
The new low-end Lucent VPN Gateway 80, priced at less than $5,000, is designed for small and branch offices. The IPSec client was enhanced with a personal edition firewall for securing shared network access by telecommuters, as well as with support for the new release of LSMS.
LSMS 5.0 is also being integrated with the Access Point QVPN Builder to provide a common management environment for centralized provisioning.
The enhancements and new products are due in the second quarter.
One Lucent customer believes the new low-end VPN Gateway 80 will be useful for the growing number of telecommuters and road warriors.
"Telecommuting is getting a lot more common. People also have greater expectations of what they can do from the road," said Joseph Inzerillo, director of technology at Chicago's United Center, which hosts the Bulls basketball and Blackhawks hockey teams. "It used to be just checking e-mail was fine, but now people expect to be able to see Web-based applications like self-service human resources, financials, Web-based scheduling and contact management, and those have to be secured."
A stake in the ground
This product rollout will put a stake in the ground that will make Lucent, of Murray Hill, N.J., the supplier with the greatest breadth of offerings, according to one veteran analyst.
"They have the best coverage going, and it was a very good try on their part do to the integration, but it's still piecemeal," said Frank Dzubeck, president of Communication Network Architects Inc., a Washington consulting firm.
Lucent is at www.lucent.com.
Additional reporting by John Rendleman
