MPLS/MEF Switches and NIDs

[Colton Conor <colton.conor () gmail com>]

For MPLS and MEF switches, I know Juniper, Cisco, and Nokia are commonly
talked about on this list. However, I was wondering if anyone has
evaluated other brands? We are not interested in looking at chinese based
vendors, so ZTE and Huawei are not an option. Anyone else worth looking
into?

We have used Juniper's ACX line primarily, but there is a big gap in their
product line. The ACX2200 has only two 10G ports. The next jump up from
there is the ACX710 with 24 10G ports. They have nothing in between that
has 4-12 10G ports. Not to mention, Juniper is very proud price wise. We
are looking for cost efficient 10G NIDs with at least 4 10G ports on them
and aggregation boxes with at least 12 10G ports on them with 25g/100G
uplinks.

Ciena seems to have multiple options available with Segment Routing, MPLS,
and streaming telemetry support. I am probably most interested in
what Ciena has to offer. Has anyone deployed the 3000 or 5000 product line
of Ciena? How does it compare to Juniper? The Ciena 3924 is sub $1000 for
example, and has 4 10G ports on it.

Adva has quite a few options as well, but I don't think their routing stack
is as strong as Ciena's.

Tejas was an unknown player to me, but they seem to have a couple of
options that fit the bill. Price wise, I have heard the run circles around
everyone.

RAD has some options, but their pricing looks much higher than Ciena.

Accedian looked interesting, but it seems they don't make aggregation
switches, only NIDs.

ECI Telecom / Ribbon seems to have some options, but I have not talked to
them.

What does Nokia and Cisco have in this space, and price wise is it going to
compare to these less known vendors?