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A Scalable Approach to Gigabit Ethernet

Broadcom Corporation 

White Paper

06/27/02

■ BCM567x/BCM569x

THE LAN SWITCHING LANDSCAPE

Enterprise network traffic volumes are accelerating quickly. As a result, organizations are seeking much faster LAN

connections—to gigabit speeds and beyond—not only in their campus backbones, but also in their wiring closets for high-

speed connectivity all the way to user desktops.

There are several application drivers behind the

exploding volumes of enterprise traffic. Businesses

are continuing to grow progressively more reliant on

their corporate networks for automating their

business processes. For example, Web-centric

applications, often multimedia in nature, have

emerged not only to reach employees across

corporate intranets, but also to enable enterprises to

communicate with their business partners across

extranets and to serve customers via the Internet.

Specifically, a few of the primary applications driving

gigabit-speed network requirements include

following:

• Storage-area networks, which allow multiple

servers access to the same storage devices

connected by a multi gigabit-speed switch

• Network-based corporate training, often

involving streaming media or interactive video

conferencing

• Network-based transport for PC and server data

backup

• IP PBXs, which enable the convergence of voice

and data on the corporate LAN

Projected Gigabit Ethernet Growth*

No. of Ports

(in millions)

104

Equipment Sales

(in US $Billions)

$18.9

$11.5

5

2001 2006

2001 2006

*Combined 1-GE and 10-GE market opportunity

Source: Pioneer Consulting, LLC

THE MARKET OPPORTUNITY

The sheer volume of traffic spilling onto corporate networks is driving Gigabit Ethernet switch requirements. The Dell'Oro

Group, for example, predicts that worldwide Ethernet switch sales will increase from $11.5 billion in 2001 to $18.9 billion in

2006. The firm attributes the predicted growth to the availability of 10-Gigabit Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet over copper, and

Layer 3 Ethernet switching technologies. These market figures indicate that LAN switch makers are quickly coming under

market pressure to deliver their Gigabit Ethernet systems.

DESIGN CHALLENGES

In this milieu, equipment-makers are faced with several challenges. These include being able to quickly build high-

availability, high-throughput devices that can scale to meet the needs of various-sized and growing businesses. Designers

also must be able to easily setup their devices in the configurations that match their target customer and application. These

configurations include the following:

• Stackable switches for wiring closet applications

• Chassis-based systems for highly resilient backbone applications

• Integrated switch/servers for high-speed server interconnections

• Standalone or “fixed” switches for small/medium-sized enterprise applications

• Unmanaged switches for small environments with no IT support

Document 567x_569x-WP100-R

Broadcom Corporation

The LAN Switching Landscape Page 1

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