A group of networking hardware vendors have teamed up to improve service and support for customers using multi-vendor networks. The formation of the group, called the Networking Technical Support Alliance, was announced at the Systems Support Expo in Boston. The Alliance starts life with 10 companies: Chipcom Inc, Cisco Systems Inc, Hewlett-Packard Co, Hughes LAN Systems Inc, IBM Corp, Proteon Inc, Synoptics Communications Inc, 3Com Corp, Ungermann-Bass Inc and Wellfleet Communications Inc. Advanced Computer Communications Inc, Eicon Technology Inc, General Datacomm Industries Inc, Hughes Network Systems, Madge Networks Ltd, Newbridge Networks Inc and Olicom USA Inc are also said to have expressed interest in joining. According to Peter Felice, vice-president of customer services at Hughes LAN Systems, the idea is to avoid situations where suppliers blame each other for non-functioning equipment. If one of vendor A’s customers has a problem with the interoperability of two products, the customer could call vendor A. Vendor A, on behalf of the customer, would call vendor B and register it as a Networking Technical Support Alliance call, he said. Ultimately, the customer is always going to call in through one particular vendor, but the hope of the alliance is that the vendors will work on a quid pro quo basis, he added. Where vendors cannot agree on where the problem lies, they will at least inform the customer in writing of the reason. Generally, these kinds of problems rarely turn out to be unresolvable, said Felice. The Alliance will consist of a Management Committee, Standing Committees, a Customer Advisory Board and Members at Large. Membership is open to any company that designs, manufactures, sells or supports generally-available products conforming to layer 3 or below of the Open Systems Interconnection model, such as bridges, routers, hubs or adaptor boards.
