Cisco certification vs. Nortel, Foundry, Juniper, etc.

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Out of curiosity, I checked to see if other manufacturer's of routers offered certification similar to Cisco's. I was somewhat surprised to discover, that yes, not only do they offer certs for their products, but that the scope and breadth of their exams rivals that of Cisco! Nortel and Juniper esp. have quite a variety of certs to pursue.

So this got me wondering, whereas Cisco certs are almost universally respected and sought, what is the market like for say, a Juniper Certified Expert? Would a potential employer give the same weight to a non-Cisco routing/networking cert? The technology is more or less the same afterall - the difference would be akin to an auto mechanic being Ford certified vs. Chrysler certified. Or, would a Juniper or Nortel certified engineer only hold value to an organization that actually uses products of those manufacturers?

 

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Well its more akin to being certified to maintain a standard car engine, or a tank engine
although technically very similar, the makeup of the engine is completly different

routing is routing, networking is networking, but juniper and cisco take different approaches in the way they allow you to interface with it

The main issue is that primarily, Juniper, Nortel and Foundry gear is limited to big ISPs and service providors, as well as very major coporates (nortel has a place in regular business, but it seems stark in comparison), Ciscos brand recognition penetrates even the smallest of companies, and as such your demand for employment will be much higher, albiet with alot more competition

Theres no doubt that the other players have valid and useful cert tracks, but only if your likely to use thier products, I couldnt really advise taking the cert on the hopes that you will land a job using the products, rather get a job that happens to use those products and then specialise

i know its not much, but hope that helps

 

Thank you for the info- it was quite useful.

See, I was thinking that with so many Cisco certified people out there, that perhaps being Nortel or Foundry certified would be a good way to distinguish oneself. But I suppose the drawbacks outweigh any possible benefit for someone trying to sell themself as a networking expert. Like you said, Cisco has lion's share of the market.

 

I'll say this much...

When someone NEEDS a certfied professional with Juniper, Foundry, Enterarsys, Extreme, Nortel, 3Com, Huawei, etc...

They are usually prepared to pay for it.

And while they may accept a Cisco Certified Professional, they would prefer a specialist and realize a specialist is hard to find.