[By NBC-1TV H. J Yook]Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) announced its new portfolio of small and midsize business solutions to over 300 channel partners at the Asia Pacific, Japan and Greater China (APJC) Partner-Led Network Event. The new portfolio will help Cisco partners better serve customers who are looking to increase productivity by enabling mobile employees to work and collaborate with a high degree of security. Ultimately, this launch is about connecting people, a key part of Cisco's Work Your Way vision.

Cisco's partner-led go-to-market model empowers Cisco channel partners to lead customer engagement in the small business and midmarket segments with new offerings such as:

· A new all-in-one security solution, the Cisco® ISA500 Series Integrated Security Appliances, which combine highly secure Internet, wireless, dual wide-area network (WAN), site-to-site, and remote VPN access with unified threat management (UTM) capabilities.

· New collaboration products that include the Cisco SPA232D Multi-Line DECT ATA, an affordable and reliable voice gateway with an integrated DECT base station to route voice over IP (VoIP) calls to the PSTN. Also new in the collaboration portfolio is the Cisco SPA302D Multi-Line DECT Handset and the Cisco SPA500DS Expansion Module, a digital attendant console that attaches to the SPA500 Series IP Phones.

· The Cisco RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router with 3G/4G, an affordable and easy-to-use wireless router that supports a wide variety of connectivity options including 3G and 4G via USB.

· Software updates for the Cisco WAP121 Wireless-N Access Point with Power over Ethernet (PoE) and the Cisco WAP321Wireless-N Selectable-Band Access Point with PoE. The firmware upgrades will enable single-point setup to simplify the deployment of office-wide wireless networks.

· For partners and customers who want to offer value-added network management services, the Cisco OnPlus family of cloud-based network management services helps simplify the monitoring, management, and maintenance of small and midsize networks. OnPlus Security is currently offered with the ISA500 in Australia and New Zealand only.

Also included in this portfolio are Cisco Jabber® and Cisco WebEx® solutions, which can further boost Cisco's highly secure and flexible collaboration experience for small and midsize customers. These solutions are also being introduced to channel partners in the region through the biannual Cisco Advantage Now! roadshows, which are being held in almost 100 cities in APJC.