Ruckus Unveils New Edge-To-Core Switch Line To Meet Next Wave Of Campus Networking Needs

Ruckus Networks, an Arris Company, introduced a new switch family aimed at bringing more gigabit throughput from the core to the edge of the network.

The new Ruckus ICX 7850 switch line was built with scale in mind. The offering provides high-density aggregation up to 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE)as businesses continue their multi-gigabit network growth, Siva Valliappan, vice president of wired products for Ruckus Networks, told CRN.

"There's been a hole in terms of offerings from our peers in the industry. We're pleased to be able to say that we're the first vendor to give a 100 GbE solution from the closet to the core," Valliappan said.

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Specifically, the high-performance ICX 7850 line of three new switches, the ICX 7850-32Q, ICX 7850-48FS, and ICX 7850-48F that supports 10 GbE, 25GbE, 40 GbE, 50 GbE, and 100 GbE can use existing fiber and network infrastructure that a business might have in place for a simple upgrade to the enterprise edge network. The latest switch family is an upgrade to the Ruckus Wireless ICX 7750 campus switch line.

The new switch is a stackable option that can also be deployed virtually. Like all of Ruckus' switches, the ICX 7850 supports the latest security standards and encryption technologies, Valliappan said.

"We built a flexible solution that really draws on the best of data center practices," he said. "You need performance at the core to help at the edge."

Ruckus, headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, said the latest switch plays well to its base of customers in education, government and enterprise settings. Ruckus does all its business through the channel, and the vendor believes that its solution provider partners, especially MSPs, have a great opportunity to manage their customers' high-performance networks.

The new switch family, Valliappan said, is coming at a time when network infrastructure is ripe for disruption. New use cases such as IoT are increasing the load at the edge of the network and driving businesses to look for a high performing switch that can keep up with these new demands, he said.

The ICX 7850 switch will also help businesses keep up with wireless technology advances, including 802.11ax, also known as Wi-Fi 6, and LTE.

"The wired and wireless portfolio have come together within Ruckus, and now we are the first to market to deliver a hybrid, gigabit solution from the edge to the core in order to support things like IoT and LTE," he said. "The Ruckus of today is able to provide all the elements a partner and customer may need to provide a full network infrastructure solution."