Software-defined networking vendors such as Embrane and Nicira have found customers in the managed-hosting realm, and with more startups bringing products to market, enterprises could follow suit later this year. Read more »
The growth of public and private cloud services places new demands on the IT organization, particularly when it comes to the scale, agility and management of the data center. SDNs are a response to those demands, providing opportunities for IT managers to improve their network operations. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
The software-defined networking (SDN) market is expected to soar in size to $2 billion by 2016, according to IDC. Growth this fast may very well signify that SDN is the third epoch of computer networking, creating vendor discontinuities and a new IT order. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
VMware’s planned acquisition of Nicra for $1.25 billion represents the evolution of networking beyond the hardware-dominated point of view that has sustained the industry for decades. Here’s what that means for startups in the networking realm as well as for the industry giants. Read more »
“Infrastructure of the future will be programmed,” says Dante Malagrinò, Co-Founder and CEO of Embrane, at GigaOM’s Structure conference on Thursday. Read more »
Discussions about the cloud now involve more than just the IT department. New developments in hardware architectures, more-energy-efficient data centers, regulatory concerns and simplifying analytics are all discussions currently circling through the industry. Here’s what to consider when thinking about your business in the cloud. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Nicira, the networking startup that is not so stealthy but seriously hot, is ready to tell the world what it offers and who is buying its software. The list of customers is impressive. Nicira’s Network Virtualization Platform is used at eBay, NTT, AT&T, Fidelity Investments and Rackspace. Read more »
Playing off the interest in creating software defined networks for virtualized environments, startup ConteXtream has launched a product that allows a data center operator to separate network services such as firewalls and load balancers from the physical hardware. It joins several startups pushing virtualized networks. Read more »
Embrane, the not-so-stealthy startup that’s one of several hoping to make it big on the concept of virtualizing the network, launched Sunday. The company, founded in 2010 by Dante Malagrinò, has raised $27 million to provide firewalls, load balancers and more via distributed software. Read more »
Vyatta, which provides open-source networking software, has raised $12 million in expansion round financing as the entire networking field finds itself on the cusp of big changes. The round, its fifth, was led by HighBAR Partners and brings Vyatta’s total funding to $45 million. Read more »
Last quarter we highlighted the fast maturation of the Platform-as-a-Service and big data spaces. Those two trends only picked up speed during the third quarter of 2011. Joining them on the cusp of IT greatness, though, are the OpenStack project and flash storage. The former gathered serious validation from big-name companies, while the latter saw less funding than last quarter but a significant number of product launches. Of course, the third quarter wasn’t all lollipops and rose petals. We saw new computing technologies and delivery models such as tablets wreak havoc on both HP and Cisco, and there are concerns (aren’t there always?) about how the Internet will handle our increased use of streaming video and cloud computing. Unfortunately for HP and Cisco, the latter problem might be an easier fix than the strategic woes facing them. Additional companies mentioned in this report include CloudBees, Rackspace, Engine Yard and Joyent. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
The buzz around OpenFlow is increasing with a few case studies out last month, some fundings and a new beta product from a vendor pushing a software-defined network controller. And now there’s a developing programming language for virtualized networks, called Frenetic. Read more »
The world of networking is changing, thanks to shifting traffic patterns, more widely distributed webscale systems and the economic need for the networking world to catch up to where the computing and server world is today. This trend toward networking virtualization has huge implications for vendors such as Cisco, Juniper, Arista, Dell and Intel, but it also could become the foundation for an entire new ecosystem of startups and value creation, much like what the creation of the hypervisor did for computing. In this research note we look at what network virtualization is, why we’re moving toward it, what OpenFlow is and what the opportunities are for companies, both large and small, beyond that technology. Additional companies mentioned in this report include Facebook, SeaMicro and Zynga. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Embrane, which builds tools that will enable cloud providers to scale out networking services faster and with less complexity, has raised $18 million in second round funding. The networking sector is heating up as virtualization complicates communication between servers and data centers. Read more »
The shift in networking and the hype around the OpenFlow protocol has led to a a lot of confusion and overinflation of what OpenFlow can do. To get a bit more grounded in reality, I spoke with NEC about what its customers are doing. Read more »
BigSwitch was one of 10 companies launching at our Structure 2011 conference last week, but it’s also riding a sea change in the networking world. I chatted briefly with BigSwitch cofounders to learn a bit more about its goals and opportunities. Read more »
Networking is getting sexy again, thanks to OpenFlow and other approaches to network virtualization. So what has prompted this movement towards smarter and more flexible networks? Blame it on the cloud, and the fact that the old ways of networking simply can’t keep up with it. Read more »
In five short years, cloud computing has gone from being a quaint technology to a major catchphrase. Amazon and others are now moving at Internet speed, trying to offer better security, faster networking, more compliance and a host of other products that are attempting to meet the demands of startups, consumers and enterprises alike. On GigaOM’s Structure channel, we cover the gear and software that comprises the cloud, the services and the people who are changing the industry. Now for the first time, we’ve decided to condense that knowledge into the Structure 50, a list of the 50 companies that are influencing how the cloud and infrastructure evolves. All of these players, big or small, have people, technology or strategies that will help shape the way the cloud market is developing and where it will eventually end up. Companies mentioned in this report include Amazon, Rackspace, Cloudera, China Telecom and SeaMicro. For a full list of companies, and to see the Structure 50 as one full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
