Legacy equipment – a product already discontinued by the manufacturer, or targeted for extinction – creates serious challenges for network operators. Managing end of life or manufacturer discontinued devices strains daily operations and poses unacceptable risks for utilities, large financial institutions, government agencies, and other operators of mission-critical networks. Losing vendor support for key systems such as digital cross-connects (DCS/DACS) leaves network operators without their highest level of support in the event of catastrophic failure. Access to spares and replacements becomes limited and more expensive.

Taking a practical and pragmatic approach to replacing legacy devices overcomes these challenges – and actually increases network efficiency and reliability. Removing unsupported equipment presents an excellent opportunity to improve network quality and performance:

• Minimize the risk of catastrophic outages
• Recover stranded bandwidth and transition circuits to optimal routes
• Reduce operational costs and complexity

Perhaps most importantly, network operators can further reduce costs by deploying replacement platforms that efficiently consolidate diverse communications services and protocols.