The Cisco CCIE Service Provider certification is intended to validate your skills in working with complex service provider solutions. This designation is a real mark on your CV list that proves your leading place in Service Provider technologies. Passing two exams is required to gain this Cisco accreditation, such as a qualifying exam and a lab exam.
Implementing and Operating Cisco Service Provider Network Core Technologies simply known as 350-501 evaluation is the first step on your way to obtain an expert-level certification from Cisco. The exam checks your knowledge of service provider infrastructure and grants you the Cisco Certified Specialist - Service Provider Core certification at once. Also, exam 350-501 is associated with the CCNP Service Provider accreditation.
In brief, the exam lasts for 120 minutes and will cost you $400. It examines your skills in using core service provider network technologies, which include core architecture, networking, automation, services, quality of services, security, and network assurance.
The first topic covered in the exam refers to architecture. In this section you should demonstrate your skills to describe QoS architecture, service provider architectures, and Cisco network software architecture. Your ability to check control plane security, use data plane security, and describe management plane security will also be assessed.
The second domain is centered on networking. Here, you should possess top-notch skills to use IS-IS, OSPF, BGP, HA, along with routing policy language and route maps. In addition, you should be able to describe troubleshoot routing protocols, how BGP path is selected utilizing a definite algorithm, and how to describe IPv6 transition.
The third section is dedicated to MPLS and segment routing. This exam topic measures your skills in applying MPLS, to be more precise, LDP sync/session protect/neighbors, unified MPLS, and MPLS OAM. And your skills to describe traffic engineering and segment routing will also be examined.
The fourth section is all about services. You should show how competent you are in describing VPN services, using multicast services and QoS services. Besides, your skills to configure Carrier Ethernet, L2VPN, along with L3VPN will be tested.
The fifth section is focused on assurance and automation. The skills measured within this section involve ability to describe the role of NSO, programmable APIs, high-level benefits and principles. Your proficiency in interpreting an external script will also be assessed. In addition, you should know the difference between agent and agentless configuration management tools, and be ready to configure and check NETCONF and RESTCONF, SNMP, and NetFlow.
The CCIE Service Provider v5.0 lab exam which is next evaluation you are to take, lasts 8 hours and aims to verify your skills to provide the whole lifecycle of complex service provider networks.
Satisfying your curiosity about the annual paycheck with this designation, consider the fact that certified candidates with the CCIE Service Provider accreditation earn annually from $46,072 to $64,592 per annum, as stated on the Ziprecruiter website.