Having acquired #Avaya ’s #SDN and switching business, and with its purchase of #Brocade ’s datacentre unit imminent, #ExtremeNetworks is on a mission to secure customers’ hearts and minds and take business from rivals Fast-growing networking hardware and software-defined networking (SDN) systems supplier Extreme Networks has revealed it is looking to target customers of sector giants #Cisco and Hewlett-Packard Enterprise ( #HPE ) as it wraps up a series of acquisitions, most recently of Avaya’s switching and SDN business.
After its concurrent purchase of Brocade’s datacentre networking business is finalised this autumn, Extreme Networks will become the third-largest networking supplier in the world, behind HPE and Cisco. It also bought the wireless local area network (WLAN) assets of Zebra Technologies in September 2016.
Sean Collins, Extreme’s regional director of the UK, Ireland and Benelux, told Computer Weekly: “The ambition is there to be the number one alternative to Cisco and HP with a targeted SDN vision.”
Extreme already markets SDN products and the prominence of Avaya’s own Fabric Connect SDN line, which Collins described as a “clear differentiator”, was a major factor in its purchasing decision.
ZK Research analyst and founder Zeus Kerravala said: “Avaya’s strength in the core and campus perfectly complements Extreme Networks’ market focus. Additionally, the acquisition is a positive move for Extreme Networks, Avaya and both customer bases as it creates a company with best-in-class products that span the entire enterprise network.”
But other observers have suggested that, given the scale of the integration task at hand across the three acquired businesses, challenges may lie ahead for Extreme. Speaking to SearchNetworking in March 2017, Gartner analyst Mark Hung raised questions about whether Extreme would be able to execute across three different fronts at once.
To make this task easier, Extreme has implemented a transactional services agreement to enable the Avaya business to be run by the same people and in the same way, at least to begin with.
“They will continue to run the business and provide a soft landing for customers and partners while we integrate the back-end systems,” said Collins.
http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450423930/Expanding-Extreme-eyes-Cisco-HPE-networking-business
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