Alcatel-Lucent sets new standard for enterprise network security and compliance with next-generation OmniAccess 8550 Web Services Gateway

Paris, December 10, 2007 ­– Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) today announced the availability of the Alcatel-Lucent OmniAccess 8550 Web Services Gateway (WSG), the industry’s first network appliance that allows controlled access to sensitive information across multiple IT systems, by implementing stateful information access policies, organization-wide and in real-time. The OmniAccess 8550 WSG is the only network-embedded solution available today, which supports and secures automated business processes while ensuring regulatory compliance, protecting sensitive corporate information from misuse and ensuring its availability when and where it is needed. It enables corporate-wide interoperability among business-critical internal information systems and external partner networks, providing a corporate wide compliance infrastructure reducing costs and risk. 

“With the OmniAccess 8550 WSG, Alcatel-Lucent is taking a highly-integrated approach to helping IT departments mitigate risks while managing costs,” said Chris Christiansen, program vice president for IDC's Security Products and Services group. “The market opportunity to provide security solutions that enable companies to meet compliance concerns represents a significant vision for Alcatel-Lucent in serving the enterprise.”

The OmniAccess 8550 WSG is ideal for industries with an immediate business-critical need to protect end user privacy, such as in health care, government, education, and finance. Prior to today’s announcement, Alcatel-Lucent successfully had the product evaluated with a select group of companies including HP, a knowledgeable player in the SOA market, and Advocate Health Care, a leading U.S. integrated health care delivery network.

“The Alcatel-Lucent OmniAccess 8550 WSG SOA Appliance has a strong focus on security and compliance,” said Avrami Tzur, vice president, SOA, Technology Solutions Group, HP. “We see a need in the market for a product providing security policy enforcement such as information access control, especially when coupled with HP's proactively governed SOA infrastructure.”

“I have searched for a solution to secure our on-line processes and B2B operations, but have not seen any product comparable to Alcatel-Lucent’s OmniAccess 8550 WSG in its ability to ensure information privacy and guaranteetraceability of user activity,” stated Gary Horn, director of Enterprise Architecture and Network Security, Advocate Health Care, Oakbrook, IL. “This is a problem seen by many health careproviders in the U.S. I recognize the tremendous potential to streamline and secure our network operations. A product like the OmniAccess 8550 web services gateway gives us the ability to trace user activity and ensure information privacy, which are business critical in today’s market,” Horn added.

Alcatel-Lucent is delivering security features that go beyond traditional secure networking to meet heightened information privacy regulations, serve an increasingly mobile workforce, and provide an open architecture to maximize flexibility and choice.  The new web services gateway is the latest offering in a rapidly expanding portfolio of innovative security solutions from Alcatel-Lucent that helps enterprises manage user access to corporate data, applications and communication. 

Earlier this year, Alcatel-Lucent introduced the OmniAccess Safeguard solution and the award-winning OmniAccess 3500 Nonstop Laptop Guardian. The OmniAccess Safeguard manages user access and restricts application use while on the network, characterizes traffic patterns, identifies intrusions based on pre-configured heuristics, and protects users and the network against known or unknown attacks. The OmniAccess 3500 Nonstop Laptop Guardian is a revolutionary laptop security and management system developed to secure, monitor, manage and locate a mobile computer, anywhere, anytime, even when it’s shut off.

“Alcatel-Lucent is positioned for growth as an enterprise security solutions provider with the OmniAccess 8550 Web Services Gateway being the third innovative security solution being introduced this year,” said Michel Emelianoff, vice president of Enterprise Security Solutions at Alcatel-Lucent. “The market is at an inflection point, the product addresses real enterprise pain points, and the offering is unique in its ability to integrate context based application and information security inside and outside the network."

The OmniAccess 8550 WSG employs industry-leading session-based, stateful XML message inspection technology to deliver consolidated audit trails and run-time policy enforcement. Interoperability features include service mediation, performance monitoring and load balancing; security features also include single identity, altogether providing for a corporate-wide compliance infrastructure protecting corporate data and identity privacy.

Alcatel-Lucent and OmniAccess 8550 Web Services Gateway are trademarks of Alcatel-Lucent. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners.