Italtel, Cisco Target Latin America

MILAN, Italy -- Italtel, one of the leading companies providing solutions, products and services for Next - Generation Networks (NGN) and Next - Generation Services (NGS), and Cisco Systems announced today the signing of a new agreement to extend their strategic technology and commercial alliance to 2008, with an expanded market coverage beyond Europe, Middle East and Africa to include the Latin America region.

Since signing the original strategic alliance agreement in early 2005, Italtel and Cisco have worked together on joint technology solutions for service providers focused on optimization of network infrastructures, multimedia communication services for the consumer segment, and hosted and managed Unified Communication services for the business segment.

Recent successful deployments include BT-Albacom, Belgacom, EITC (du) in the United Arab Emirates, Telecom Italia and Telekomunikacja Polska, among others.

“We’re extremely pleased to announce that Italtel and Cisco Systems have further reinforced our strategic alliance,” comments Mauro Righetti, chief executive officer of Italtel. “We’re fully satisfied with the results we have reached so far. The alliance has allowed for the development of an offer that fully matches the requirements and demands of the market, covering all aspects of the network,” continues Righetti. “Our leadership in Softswitch technology and Cisco’s leadership in IP Next Generation Networks (IP NGN) and IP communications are the best complementary conditions for playing a crucial role in the new market, arising from the migration of existing voice infrastructure to IP-based networks.”

Italtel SpA

Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO)