Juniper deal kills Lucent's 'WaveSmith-killer'

Editor's Note: Click here for the article about Juniper's "Service Built Edge" initiative"

The 100-odd employees let go by Lucent this week can blame Lucent's deal with Juniper for their walking papers.

The Westford, Mass.-based workforce was working on a next-generation multiservice edge device - a Cascade ATM/SpringTide IP switch hybrid referred to internally as the "WaveSmith-killer," in deference to the start-up company recently acquired by Ciena. But the project was canceled and employees notified of their impending release earlier this quarter, around the time the ink was drying on the Lucent/Juniper joint product development and marketing partnership, sources say.

"Yeah, that was my new project," said one unlucky Lucent staffer, referring to WaveSmith-killer.

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Editor's Note: Click here for the article about Juniper's "Service Built Edge" initiative"

The 100-odd employees let go by Lucent this week can blame Lucent's deal with Juniper for their walking papers.

The Westford, Mass.-based workforce was working on a next-generation multiservice edge device - a Cascade ATM/SpringTide IP switch hybrid referred to internally as the "WaveSmith-killer," in deference to the start-up company recently acquired by Ciena. But the project was canceled and employees notified of their impending release earlier this quarter, around the time the ink was drying on the Lucent/Juniper joint product development and marketing partnership, sources say.

"Yeah, that was my new project," said one unlucky Lucent staffer, referring to WaveSmith-killer.

Lucent and Juniper are developing a range of products designed to merge their respective technologies. WaveSmith-killer ostensibly would have been a frame/ATM/MPLS switch with high frame/ATM virtual circuit density, and IP/MPLS edge routing and VPN tunneling services support from SpringTide. But Lucent and Juniper are now offering an IP VPN system based on current products - Juniper is the source of the IP VPN content.

And both are working on an IP/MPLS multiservice core that will support ATM/frame and IP services on a converged IP/MPLS core that will leverage Lucent's Fluid Signaling technology, according to Ken Packert, president of multiservice switching at Lucent.

"Fluid Signaling is a must, absolutely," Packert said at the recent Supercomm 2003 exhibition in Atlanta when asked if the technology would be used in the products co-developed with Juniper.

Fluid Signaling was to be a feature on Lucent's discontinued TMX 880 MPLS core switch. Fluid Signaling maps bidirectional ATM permanent virtual circuits - set up by PNNI or Lucent's proprietary VNN signaling -into two unidirectional MPLS label-switched paths, and vice versa.

Asked about the WaveSmith killer development, Packert said at Supercomm: "We have a WaveSmith killer in the products we have together" with Juniper.

Lucent announced its intention to pursue partnerships, such as the one with Juniper, after announcing a product rationalization strategy that conspicuously excluded its SpringTide IP Services Switch, among other products. The SpringTide switch was subsequently discontinued.

This week, Lucent said it would not comment on product development speculation nor confirm the number of employees let go in Westford.