Recent Ethernet RFIs Show Chinks In Providers' Armor

Whenever making a major change to a critical network, it's important for enterprises to conduct both requests for information (RFIs) and requests for proposals (RFPs). Recent work Forrester undertook with some key clients who have very demanding performance requirements shows that taking shortcuts can be a serious mistake. These companies are interested in migrating to Ethernet services for intranet and extranet connectivity to obtain improved latency, data loss, and corruption metrics compared with MPLS networks. However, our RFI work with these clients shows that very few providers were able to demonstrate that they understood the clients' connectivity and performance requirements and could provide tangible and potentially cost-effective solutions. The pool of viable candidates became so small that we recommended that the clients delay issuing RFPs until they conducted dual carrier trials in both the US and Western Europe.