HP to OEM Packet Design Tech

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Packet Design, Inc., today has announced that its IP route-analysis technology has been licensed by HP for integration into the HP OpenView management software suite by early next year.

The OEM agreement reflects the first pairing of traditional device-oriented network management technology, typified by HP OpenView Network Node Manager, with emerging layer 3 route-analysis technology, which provides visibility into the routing paths traversed by network traffic. The combination of technologies will enable network operators to perform more effective and accurate root-cause analysis of network problems by combining routing-path knowledge with device-status knowledge.

Under the terms of the multi-year agreement, HP has obtained a license for the software used in Packet Design's Route Explorer network appliance, introduced in 2002. In the coming months, HP plans to create extensions that allow Network Node Manager to directly access data gathered by Route Explorer. Beginning in second quarter 2004, HP's worldwide direct sales force and reseller partners will sell the Packet Design software packaged in an HP-branded appliance.

Managing From Within The Network, At The Speed Of The Network

Doug Brent, Packet Design CEO, said, "Packet Design designed Route Explorer with the idea of its being tightly coupled with traditional network management systems to share critical network data. HP is making our route-analysis functionality an integrated part of the industry's most popular management suite, in use by all of the Fortune 100 companies and thousands more. Together the two solutions will offer users a true network-wide view that will be invaluable in the root-cause analysis of network problems."

Todd DeLaughter, vice president and general manager, Management Software Organization, HP, added, "Packet Design's work to advance customers' ability to watch and analyze network paths and support a multitude of routing protocols in heterogeneous environments has established them as the leader in route-analysis technology. Integrating this functionality with HP’s leading OpenView management software solution is an excellent fit with our Adaptive Enterprise strategy, which calls for management tools to be able to respond real-time to changes in modern, dynamic networks."

Localizing Known Problems, Pinpointing Hidden Ones

Packet Design route-analysis technology will work with HP OpenView Network Node Manager in two ways. First, Packet Design route analysis will quickly identify logical network service failures that trigger HP OpenView to intelligently diagnose problems to pinpoint underlying physical failures, improving the root-cause analysis and mean-time-to-repair for typical network problems.

It will also detect layer 3 problems that layer 2 tools previously had no knowledge of because there were no immediate symptoms; for example, misconfiguration of a redundant link goes unnoticed because the primary link is still working, but the user continues to pay for the costly redundant link and may suffer complete connectivity loss if the primary link also fails.

HP's branded route-analysis appliance will include full Route Explorer functionality, with the ability to "listen" to the network control plane, compute and display a layer 3 topology map which is updated in real time as network changes occur. Routing events are logged in a local database, and can be played back and analyzed to diagnose intermittent and hard-to-detect problems. HP’s integrated product will offer all current and future routing-analysis modules supported by Packet Design, including those for OSPF (Open Shortest Path First), IS-IS (Intermediate System-Intermediate System) and BGP (Border Gateway Protocol).

Packet Design Inc.

Hewlett-Packard Co.