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Cisco Pricing Undercut By $100M In Big Cal State University Network Project

Posted by Soulskill on from the added-an-extra-zero dept.

alphadogg writes "The $100 million price differential between the Alcatel-Lucent and Cisco proposals to refresh California State University's 23-campus network revealed earlier this week was based on an identical number of switches and routers in various configurations. CSU allowed Network World to review spreadsheets calculating the eight-year total cost of ownership of each of the five bidders for the project. 'Everybody had to comply with this spreadsheet,' said CSU's director of cyberinfrastructure. 'Alcatel-Lucent won the project with a bid of $22 million. Cisco was the high bidder with a cost just under $123 million. Not only was Cisco's bid more than five-and-a-half times that of Alcatel-Lucent's, it was three times that of the next highest bidder: HP, at $41 million.'"

5 of 220 comments (clear)

  1. Re:I knew cisco was expensive by tdelaney · · Score: 5, Informative

    People who don't get competitive quotes but always buy Cisco because that's what they know.

  2. Re:Maybe raising taxes isn't the only solution. by NotSanguine · · Score: 5, Informative

    America spends more per capita on its schools than any other nation in the world.

    Actually, we rank fourth

    And on a percentage of GDP basis>/a> The US ranks 37th, tied with Estonia.

    --
    No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
  3. Re:I knew cisco was expensive by calmdude · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'm not sure that was a real quote from Cisco. It looks to me like they simply didn't want the business.

    Not really, looking at the spreadsheets, it's typical pricing for Cisco. Especially once they started quoting Nexus-backed infrastructure with OTV to stretch layer-2. You'd be surprised at how many people have been biting off on massive OTV and Nexus costs with no competitive analysis. Looks like Cal State just did an objective analysis without marketing hype, and kudos to them.

  4. Re:I knew cisco was expensive by sa666_666 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I have to completely agree with this. I've been involved with several large-scale RFPs, and this is exactly how it goes. The only thing I'd add is that like clockwork, any party that doesn't win threatens to sue someone. It happens every time. They must be teaching this in business school or something. I've never seen a more childish group of people.

  5. Re:I knew cisco was expensive by Fjandr · · Score: 4, Informative

    Just look at West Virginia's last big IT project and you'll see how Cisco stays in business.