Ipsilon Networks was a

computer networking A computer network is a set of computers sharing resources located on or provided by network nodes. The computers use common communication protocols over digital interconnections to communicate with each other. These interconnections are ma ...

company A company, abbreviated as co., is a Legal personality, legal entity representing an association of people, whether Natural person, natural, Legal person, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common p ...

which specialised in

IP switching A multilayer switch (MLS) is a computer networking device that switches on OSI layer 2 like an ordinary network switch and provides extra functions on higher OSI layers. The MLS was invented by engineers at Digital Equipment Corporation. Switch ...

during the 1990s. The first product called the IP Switch ATM 1600 was announced in March 1996 for

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

46,000. Its switch used

Asynchronous Transfer Mode Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) is a telecommunications standard defined by American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and ITU-T (formerly CCITT) for digital transmission of multiple types of traffic. ATM was developed to meet the needs of ...

(ATM) hardware combined with

Internet Protocol The Internet Protocol (IP) is the network layer communications protocol in the Internet protocol suite for relaying datagrams across network boundaries. Its routing function enables internetworking, and essentially establishes the Internet. IP h ...

routing. The company had a role in the development of the

Multiprotocol Label Switching Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) is a routing technique in telecommunications networks that directs data from one node to the next based on labels rather than network addresses. Whereas network addresses identify endpoints the labels identif ...

(MPLS) network protocol. The company published early proposals related to label switching,(known by Cisco Systems as tag switching at the time) but did not manage to achieve the market share hoped for and was purchased for $120 million by

Nokia Nokia Corporation (natively Nokia Oyj, referred to as Nokia) is a Finnish multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications industry, telecommunications, technology company, information technology, and consumer electronics corporatio ...

in December 1997. The president at the time was

Brian NeSmith Brian NeSmith is an American technology entrepreneur. He is currently the CEO of Arctic Wolf Networks, a network security startup he founded in 2012. Prior to Arctic Wolf, Brian served as president and CEO of Blue Coat Systems, which he helped ta ...

, and it was located in

Sunnyvale, California Sunnyvale () is a city located in the Santa Clara Valley in northwest Santa Clara County in the U.S. state of California. Sunnyvale lies along the historic El Camino Real and Highway 101 and is bordered by portions of San Jose to the nort ...

References

External links

Archive.org's image of Ipsilon's web site
taken several months prior to the acquisition by Nokia. Defunct networking companies Companies disestablished in 1997 Companies based in Sunnyvale, California {{Compu-network-stub