Cisco is partial to telling people that 'virtually all' of the world's Internet traffic travels over its systems.

Not any more.

According to the latest numbers from the Dell'Oro Group (http://www.delloro.com), a market research company, Juniper Networks Inc. (http://www.juniper.net) now accounts for 15 percent of sales of routers destined for the Internet core.

In other words, its beginning to justify at least a small piece of its gigantic $26.35 billion market capitalization.

All right, so 15 percent may not sound like much. But considering the almost total dominance that Cisco Systems Inc. (http://www.cisco.com) has previously enjoyed in routing, it's a highly significant number.

"I'm surprised at how well Juniper has done, and so is Wall Street. It didn't expect Juniper to do this well until next year," says Tam Dell'Oro, founder of the Dell'Oro Group.

And by making even a small dent in the Cisco hegemony, Juniper has perhaps cleared the way for other multi-gigabit and terabit router players to step up and have a crack at the market leader further down the road - if they can iron out the wrinkles in their products.

Still, for now, Cisco is anything but unhappy. The market for high-speed routers is exploding; Dell'Oro Group predicts that it will triple from $700 million in 1999 to $2 billion this year.

If Cisco maintains market share it could, theoretically, rake in $1.7 billion this year, even after Juniper has helped itself to a modest slice of the pie.

Juniper, similarly, is more than happy with its position. "The market is growing so fast that the real challenge for us is to scale up to meet demand, not to compete with Cisco," says Scott Kriens, CEO of Juniper. It's worth noting, however, that he questions whether the market will actually triple. "I couldn't say that I'm sure about that," he says

Regardless, there are three reasons for the growth in router sales: First, more Internet traffic. Second, service providers are starting to migrate from hub and spoke topologies (which require few routers), to mesh topologies (which require many). Third, use of DWDM equipment in core networks, which requires a router port to be installed to terminate each DWDM channel supported.

Those factors played a big role in driving Q3 revenues - which themselves were up 47 percent over Q2 1999. According to Dell'Oro Group, high-speed WAN routers generated $199 million in sales in the third quarter. Sales of Cisco's 12000 GSR Series accounted for $155 million. Juniper was responsible for $30 million.

What's just as significant is who isn't selling routers. Namely, the scrum of other vendors now shipping -- or trying to ship -- multi-gigabit and terabit routers into the same market.

Three of those outfits shipped products in Q3 1999: Nortel Networks Inc. (http://www.nortelnetworks.com) is selling the Versalar 15000. Ericsson Telecom AB (http://www.ericsson.com) has its Torrent IP9000. Unisphere Solutions Inc. (http://www.unisphere.cc) is selling the Redstone ERX.

Sales of each product line totaled less than $5 million. Not exactly a blistering pace.

Still, Ericsson, Nortel, and Unisphere are in the game. And now Avici is coming off the bench. It sold two routers in Q4 1999, according to Tam Dell'Oro. "Hey, it's better than nothing," she says.

And that's more than can be said for IronBridge Inc. (http://www.ironbridge.com). , Lucent Technologies Inc. (http://www.lucent.com), Pluris Inc.( http://www.pluris.com), and Tellabs Inc. (http://www.tellabs.com) -- all of which have yet to achieve the heady heights of single-figure sales shipments.

The hold ups have been caused by the significant problems that many vendors have had in getting their silicon to work (see Unisphere Trips, Stumbles ).

Is it too late for the Johnny come lately's to make an impression? Opinion, as they say, is divided.

Fans of Cisco and Juniper argue that they can, between them, offer everything for the discerning service provider.

Looking for a one-stop shop? Cisco unquestionably delivers it with its wide range of routers -- albeit slow ones, with wobbly routing code. Looking for a point-product with blistering performance? Juniper has that.

In the real world, service providers say, the situation isn't that simple, and it's far too early to rule out new players.

"Never say never. As of today these two are dominating the market place, but they can't declare a victory. If they don't work hard to deliver scalable, less expensive products, others will," says Vab Goel, vice president of emerging technologies at Qwest Communications International (http://www.qwest.com).

Goel says it will take a while for new competition to emerge. "Do I see people building boxes in the future that can start cutting into competition? Yes. Does anyone have that today? No. It will take six to twelve months for a leader to emerge out of the other players."

Qwest operates a multi-vendor policy on its network, using products from both Cisco and Juniper. "Having a multi-vendor strategy is really important because it gives you leverage over the vendor, which helps you to roll out services quickly," Goel says.

Ironically, far from being a key competitor, Juniper could turn out to be an important ally for the newcomers. "Juniper blazed a trail and showed the world that it is possible to buy routers from companies other than Cisco," says Michelle Rae McLean, director of strategic marketing at Pluris.

Pluris -- along with the other tail end Charlie's -- argue that the wait will be worth it, and that they will leapfrog both of the incumbents with massively scalable routers, with market-changing feature sets.

Sounds great, but given that they aren't delivering products, it's tough to work out if they can deliver on their promises.

In fact, what has made it yet harder to draw a bead on how these latecomers' products will actually fare in the next few quarters is the outrageous marketing tactics employed by some of the vendors.

Far and away the worst offender is Nexabit, which was acquired by Lucent in June 1999 for $900 million. Since then, Mukesh Chatter, VP and GM of Lucent's Core Routing Technologies and former CEO and founder of Nexabit Networks, has spent much time claiming that the product performs absolutely every function that a router could possibly be capable of while, simultaneously, flatly refusing to explain how it works, or to participate in industry router tests.

Some think that Lucent's posture is an inevitable consequence of a hyper-competitive networking market where marketers now call the shots. "What can you say? Chatter is the spinmeister. That's his job," says R. Scott Raynovich, New York bureau chief for Red Herring (http://www.redherring.com).

--Stephen Saunders, US Editor, Light Reading, http://www.lightreading.com