Virtual Version of Riverbed Steelhead

Riverbed Technology announced the Virtual Steelhead, a virtual version of its Riverbed Steelhead wide area network (WAN) optimization appliance. With the release of Virtual Steelhead, Riverbed is extending the reach of its market-leading WAN optimization solutions.

                                         Model Characteristics

(a) Inbound (WAN to LAN) Steelhead capacity is unrestricted; outbound WAN capacity can be expected up to the amount listed. On the 2050 total WAN capacity equals inbound traffic + outbound traffic
(c) TCP Connections can be expected up to the amount listed

Virtual Steelhead enables customers to deploy Riverbed WAN optimization solutions in a wider range of environments that may have specialized requirements, such as ruggedized environments or environments with space limitations, as well as data centers that have been heavily virtualized. Enterprises and governments now have the freedom to choose among physical Steelhead appliances, Steelhead Mobile software and Virtual Steelhead as best suits their various locations. Additionally, service providers and systems integrators that deliver managed services based on Riverbed WAN optimization now have the option to deliver a virtualized solution.

The Riverbed Steelhead product family offers organizations of all sizes acceleration of applications and data regardless of location. Riverbed WAN optimization solutions speed application performance in some cases by up to 100 times, making the WAN feel more like the LAN. More than 8,300 customers, across a wide range of markets, have implemented Riverbed WAN optimization solutions to improve remote and mobile employee productivity, enable private clouds, and provide enterprise-wide network and application visibility. As enterprises and government organizations have demanded more deployment options, Riverbed has developed innovative WAN optimization solutions with mobile, physical and now virtual form factors.

With the introduction of the Virtual Steelhead, built for the VMware vSphere Platform, organizations have the flexibility to provide anywhere access for employees from a comprehensive set of solutions that meets the needs of customers in any environment.

"Our server infrastructure is 80% virtualized today. The option to extend virtualization to a WAN optimization solution based on Riverbed’s best-of-breed Steelhead appliance will enable our continued effort to reduce our IT hardware footprint. Virtual Steelhead is built on a proven WAN optimization solution. Virtualization is an innovative way to handle consolidation, cost-control measures, and even green initiatives," said Searl Tate, director of engineering at Paul Hastings, a global law firm.

Getting Acceleration in a Wider Range of Environments The Virtual Steelhead offers customers greater flexibility to deploy Riverbed WAN optimization technology in a wider range of environments that have specialized needs and require resilience and customization, while still offering simplified management. With the Virtual Steelhead, a virtualized WAN optimization solution can now be deployed in virtualized data centers, as well as on hardened military or first responder equipment, news vans and construction trailers that are in rugged environments or where a Steelhead appliance won’t fit due to physical space limitations.

"As organizations continue to migrate toward consolidated and virtualized data centers, enterprises are turning to WAN optimization to maximize IT performance and keep end users connected to their data and applications. With the launch of Virtual Steelhead, Riverbed is providing customers with a new option that extends the reach and flexibility of its WAN optimization to new environments that often have specialized physical requirements," said Zeus Kerravala, distinguished research fellow, Yankee Group. "The Virtual Steelhead enables organizations to overcome performance challenges in a variety of environments, including military zones, emergency scenarios with first responders and transient worksites."

"The Virtual Steelhead appliance will allow us to deploy WAN optimization to remote locations with satellite links as the only means of data communication," said Jon Rudol, senior systems engineer of FHI, a global health and development organization. "We see great optimization benefits with the Steelhead appliances today, and believe the Virtual Steelhead will only further our gains, by allowing us to reduce our hardware footprint, especially since most of our field offices are severely space-constrained and subjected to harsh environmental conditions."

Virtualization in the data center holds the promise of improved server utilization, more rapid deployments and lower power consumption. With this release, organizations can virtualize the Steelhead appliance in these environments. The virtualized platform gives customers the ability to leverage existing virtual infrastructure and scale on demand. Additionally, enterprises and governments are able to update and upgrade all of their Virtual Steelhead deployments from a central location as IT resources may not be available locally. The Virtual Steelhead is available in a wide range of configurations, up to a Steelhead 2050H model appliance equivalent.

"Our customers will benefit from Riverbed’s Virtual Steelhead built to run on the VMware vSphere platform to provide optimum performance in virtualized environments," said Parag Patel, vice president, Global Strategic Alliances at VMware. "The new solution is designed to enable customers to extend the effectiveness of virtualized data centers and an assortment of unique environments without compromising performance or productivity regardless of location."

Managed Virtual Steelhead Service
Many customers have chosen WAN optimization as a managed service to optimize their bandwidth usage while simultaneously consolidating their IT infrastructure, which reduces their IT complexity and overhead. With the Virtual Steelhead, managed service providers can offer Riverbed WAN optimization solutions in a virtualized platform without having to put an additional physical box in the customer location, making provisioning easier and allowing customers to more cost-effectively reap the benefits of application acceleration and IT consolidation with a flexible pay-as-you-grow model.

"Partnering with Riverbed allows us to deliver to our customers managed services as best-of-class IT performance solutions that are critical to the success of strategic IT initiatives, including virtualization, IT consolidation and cloud computing," said Jean Critcher, solution director at Orange Business Services, a Global level partner in Riverbed’s Service Provider program. "With Virtual Steelhead, Riverbed will enable us to plan our managed service development with a more innovative approach to our enterprise customers whose needs are especially concerned with more flexible deployment options in their virtualized data centers or specialized environment."

Virtual Steelhead is expected to be generally available in Q3 2010.