MAJOR tech companies are warning that IP4 addresses are running out faster a well greased Cheetah on its way to a wildebeest convention.

The Global IPv6 Summit in Beijing has heard how the situation was reaching crisis point and all the IP4 addresses will be gone in three years.

This means that the move to IP6 will be sudden and not particularly well controlled. Tony Hain, IPv6 technical leader for Cisco said that the world+dog was in a state of denial about upgrading to Ipv6 and no one will ask for IPv6 until they run out of IPv4 addresses.

Sandeep Singhal, Microsoft's director of Windows networking, said that companies need to develop a phased approach to the use of native and dual stake IPV6 they cannot simply wait until it is out there. Companies were wasting time when they should be developing IPV6 software now.

They should be starting early and learning how it all works, he said.