Cisco has unveiled a strategy and complementary products that are geared to clearing the log-jam in network backbones.

The Cisco Assure policy networking initiative allows the management of applications as opposed to enterprise management which manage devices, according to the networking company. The policy will eventually allow network devices to be managed based on user information in network directory servers.

"Network managers can use Cisco Assure to protect mission-critical traffic and offer service-level agreements. A network can be managed from a business perspective rather than device QoS," said Paul McNab, Cisco's line manager for the product range.

The use of the Common Open Policy Service (COPS) protocol will allow the policy to be implemented on edge devices from other vendors.

To enforce the policy framework Cisco has unveiled its first batch of switch routers based on the customisable Asic chip technology it acquired last year from Granite.

The Catalyst 8510 and 8540 claim to boost the speed of current backbones by up to 20 times and will be targeted at enterprise users.

The 8510 is a 10Gbps, five-slot switch router providing aggregate throughput of six million packets per second. It also supports up to 32 routed and switched Ethernet ports and up to four Gigabit Ethernet ports.

The 40Gbps 8540 model claims aggregate throughput of 24 million packets per second, while supporting up to 128 Ethernet ports, or 16 Gigabit Ethernet ports.

Networks supported include IP, IPX and IP multicasting. The products also provide security and accounting functions.

The 8510 and Cisco Assure software will ship in June, while the 8540 will be available in September.