Since 1999, IBM® and Cisco have been working closely on technology development, cooperative engineering, channel marketing, and other key initiatives. IBM has been a Cisco Strategic Alliance since August 1999, and in 2003, IBM became a Global Services Alliance partner with Cisco. On March 12, 2007, IBM and Cisco announced the expansion of the Global Services Alliance beyond the U.S., and into 46 additional countries.

Working better together, Cisco and IBM will be better able to provide our worldwide customers with a single resource that offers a more consistent, higher-quality level of support throughout the network lifecycle. IBM's collaborative service, called IBM managed maintenance solution for Cisco products, is offered by IBM and jointly delivered by IBM and Cisco This offering is designed to help improve network availability and reduce maintenance complexities through contract consolidation -- all from a single partner.

"This is a significant evolution in our Global Services Alliance," said Karl Meulema, VP, Global Strategy and Operations, Cisco Services. "Providing a collaborative maintenance service offering means our mutual customers will no longer need to choose between Cisco networking skills or IBM multivendor systems integrator capabilities. Instead customers get the collective expertise of both companies, combining the best of both worlds."

IBM managed maintenance solution for Cisco products

From IBM: Entitlement, first call technical support, end to end problem escalation and management, customer relationship and customer satisfaction management.

From Cisco: Worldwide, full-time escalation to Cisco Technical Assistance Center as needed, registered access to Cisco.com, advance hardware replacement, ongoing Cisco operating system updates, and best practices and tools.

IBM also offers onsite support, when needed in areas beyond Cisco products that may affect network performance, such as software and data networking.

About IBM managed maintenance solution for Cisco products

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