| Industry | Network switches |
|---|---|
| Fate | Acquired by Dell |
Force10 Networks (formerly nCore Networks), is a United States company which develops and markets 10 Gigabit and 100 Gigabit Ethernet switches for computer networking to corporate, educational, and governmental customers. It has offices in North America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific region.
In 2011 Dell announced that they have reached agreement to buy Force10.[1] In August 2011, Dell completed the acquisition of Force10 and changed the name to Dell Force10.
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The company was founded by PK Dubey, Naresh Nigam and Som Sikdar. It was named by founder Som Sikdar, an avid sailor, after Beaufort Force 10 (Storm, Whole gale) on the Beaufort scale for wind speeds, indicating a storm with high speed winds, and matched their focus on 10 Gigabit Ethernet switching and routing products.
In 2009, Force10 merged with Turin Networks, which had previously purchased Carrier Access Corporation and White Rock Networks. Carrier Access Corporation itself had previously purchased Mangrove Systems and White Rock Networks had previously purchased Seranoa Networks.
On July 20, 2011 Dell announced it intended to fully acquire Force10 for an undisclosed amount. With the acquisition Dell offers a complete range of products for the datacentre[2][3][1]
In January, 2002, Force10 released the E-Series E1200 switch/router, claiming line-rate 10 Gigabit Ethernet switching. Force10 Networks hoped to expand from LAN switching to midsize data centers and enterprise campus networks. The Force10 product portfolio included the E-Series family of switch/routers, the C300 switch, the S-Series family of access switches and the P-Series security appliances.
In 2007 it was actively working on 100 Gigabit Ethernet Switching.[4]
Force10 Networks uses NetBSD as the underlying operating system that powers FTOS (the Force10 Operating System).[5] Force10 made a donation to the NetBSD Foundation in 2007 to help further research and the open development community.
Force10 customers include enterprises in industries such as media, financial services, oil and gas, Web 2.0 and gaming. Service providers, including Internet exchanges, wholesale providers, cable operators, and content delivery providers. Force10 customers include Facebook , Zynga, Level3, TATA Communications (formerly VSNL, Teleglobe), Mzima Networks, Stealth Communications[6], Yahoo!, isoHunt, Sega, NYSE Euronext, Veritas DGC, Equinix, CERN, NOAA, University College London Networks Research Group[7], and the Baylor College of Medicine.[8]