Juniper Networks and IBM are broadening their strategic relationship with a new OEM agreement that will enable IBM’s System & Technology Group (STG) to brand, label and sell select Juniper EX Series Ethernet switches and MX Series Ethernet Services routers as part of its data center products and services.

“With Juniper’s Ethernet technologies added to our data center portfolio, IBM is able to offer customers more choice and flexibility in their networking solutions to address the growing demands being placed on their IT environments,” said Jim Comfort, IBM’s vice president of enterprise initiatives.

The demand on data centers increases with exploding data volumes, demand for new services, speed and security, and always-on reliability, the pair explained. The demand is exacerbated by the trend toward cloud computing.

“This OEM agreement represents a continued deepening of our relationship with IBM, and a significant new route to market for Juniper,” said Hitesh Sheth, executive vice president and general manager of the Ethernet Platforms Business Group at Juniper.

In 2007, IBM and Juniper signed a pan-IBM agreement with IBM’s Global Technology Services (GTS) group that allows GTS to resell Juniper’s product portfolio as part of its Service Product Line (SPL) solutions, including routing, switching and security technologies. This reseller agreement will continue.

IBM also offers its Managed Maintenance Services (MMS) on the Juniper product portfolio. The companies have since looked for opportunities to expand their relationship, including today’s OEM announcement with IBM’s STG, Juniper said.

For the past year, IBM and Juniper have also been working together on the Stratus Project, Juniper’s initiative to create a single data center fabric that will deliver a quantum jump in scale, performance and simplicity, with the flexibility to support fully converged and virtualized data center environments.