Experience

In an article in "The ATM Report" (May 1996), MMCI was identified as the only company that had an ATM router when the Navy's NEWNET (later remaned SMARTLINK) project was initiated in 1993. We were selected to provide the Navy with our ATM-2000 (a VME based ATM routing product) for the first DoD nationwide T3 ATM wide-are network. We designed the network topology and deployed our first generation ATM router. In addition, we assisted the Navy in extensive interoperability and performance testing for selected ATM switches from Newbridge, FORE and GDC.

Since that time, SMARTLINK has effectively demonstrated that the ATM network can reduce costs (more than 60% saving for the Navy), operate effectively at both T-1 and T-3 speeds, and transport data, image and real-time video traffic over a single network.

Tasked by the Navy, MMCI provided techical consultation for building a legacy ATM campus-wide LAN in Concord, California. This network used a fiber iptic OC-3 backbone to connect one 16x16 ATM switch with multiple ATM LAN hubs. We tested vendor equipment at the ATM test laboratory in Bethesda, MD, for:

• conformance to the ATM Forum standards,
• system performance under various traffic loads,
• ATM management implementations, and
• LAN emulation capabilities

Based on our recommendation, one vendor's equipment was selected and installed.

ATM Channel Service Unit/Data Service Unit (ADSU):

By 1995 MMCI recognized that ATM equipment vendors needed to deliver multiple services: voice, video, and data simultaneously on the same communications line if the ATM technology was to be widely accepted by the corporate community. Thus, we designed, developed and built the ADSU-2000, an ATM T1 CSU/DSU. MMCI developed the ADSU-2000 as an ATM T1 access/concentrator to provide simultaneous data and switched video services. We designed it to interface with voice PBX systems, off-the-shelf video conferencing systems, and traditional data routers and bridges.

MMCI designed and manufactured an ATM switching module (ITU-2000) that adapted the ten popular ATM local area network (LAN) TAXI and OC-3 interfaces to the widely available ATM wide-area network (WAN) T1 and T3 interfaces. Cell buffers were included in the circuit to absorb the speed difference between the interfaces. "Rate-based" traffice management algorithms were generated to provide traffice throttling functions to the ATM WAN rate-based edge switch and to prevent network congestion. MMCI developed two models of this ATM switching module: one as a SUN Microsystems SBus plug-in module and the other as a stand alone 1x1 ATM switch.

MMCI was a contributor to the design and integration of the network for Naval Medical Information Management Center, Bethesda, MD, for the 1995 On-Call JWID demonstration project. The network connected four Naval hospitals and a remote site at Camp Pendelton, California, over an AT&T satellite and Sprint's T-1 ATM terrestrial services.

Our ATM ADSU-2000 was used as the access/concentrator device on the network that supported the simulation of remote diagnoses of battlefield injuries. The demonstration was instrumental in convincing the military's medical community of the benefits to be gained from ATM.

MMCI designed and integrated an enterprise ATM backbone network for the Department of Defense Health Affairs' TRICARE project. Specifically, we designed and installed the network hub and designed and managed the network operation center at the Bethesda, MD, site. That network connected ten TRICARE sites throughout the United States using GDC ATM switches and MMCI's ADSU-2000 access/concentrators.