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AboveNet Deploys Ciena's CN 4200 FlexSelect Advanced Services Platform to Support High-Growth Private Managed Services

CN 4200's programmable, multiservice flexibility provides optimal platform for on-demand, high-bandwidth optical transport services for financial services, media and entertainment customers

Ciena® Corporation (NASDAQ: CIEN), the network specialist, today announced that AboveNet, Inc., a leader in fiber optic connectivity solutions, has deployed Ciena's CN 4200® FlexSelect™ Advanced Services Platform throughout its metro networks to power a variety of private networks transporting Ethernet, IP and other managed services. The CN 4200 is a perfect fit for AboveNet's customers that require scalable bandwidth and expanded reach capabilities for key business applications. This is particularly true for large, multinational corporations in the financial services, media and healthcare industries.

Ciena's CN 4200 enables AboveNet to offer private managed services that can be remotely provisioned on-demand to support nearly any transport service, thereby creating a managed service platform that can quickly adapt to changing customer requirements. In addition, Ciena's ON-Center® Network and Service Management Suite offers AboveNet a unique set of tools that enable efficient service deployment and proactive network management, including service monitoring, SLA verification and other service level management information.

"Customers are demanding comprehensive managed solutions to help solve IT and business challenges. They require not only bandwidth infrastructure, but also security, compliance, management tools and application-focused services," said Bill LaPerch, president and CEO of AboveNet. "In order to be successful in the high-growth managed services market, you must have a flexible, service-oriented architecture with rich management tools to address customer demands. That is why we are pleased to have chosen the CN 4200."

The CN 4200 platforms also serve as a direct extension of AboveNet's core optical network that provides high-bandwidth, long-haul service between its metro locations and is based on Ciena's CoreStream® Agility Optical Transport System. The combination of CoreStream and CN 4200 platforms enables AboveNet to offer its managed services customers scalable performance, unmatched reliability and detailed service level management on its private optical network from any metro through the core.

"As an example, analyst firm Yankee Group estimates that the worldwide market for managed E-LAN services will grow at a CAGR of 32 percent between 2006 and 2010. This growth rate illustrates the significant opportunity for AboveNet to increase revenue and strengthen customer relationships through higher-value managed services and improved response to customer requests," said Mike Aquino, senior vice president of worldwide sales at Ciena. "This deployment also showcases the unique operational benefits of the CN 4200 as a platform for powering managed optical transport services. From its FlexiPort technology and point-and-click provisioning to detailed service level management, the CN 4200 can address any customer need today and migrate as needs change over time with minimal touch and usually without new hardware."

Ciena's CN 4200 is a next-generation WDM transport and aggregation platform that can be configured on-demand to support any transport protocol—including SONET/SDH, Ethernet/GbE/10GbE, storage (Fibre Channel, FICON, ESCON) or video—at any speed, on any available port using the industry's first universal line card with individual user-programmable ports. Powered by FlexSelect OS, Ciena's intelligent control plane technology, and managed through ON-Center, the CN 4200 provides unprecedented levels of network automation, including granular service level management and remote, point-and-click provisioning for adding or dropping services on the network.