A10 Networks Unveils High-performance Software-based Application Delivery Controller

SAN JOSE, Calif., April 27 /PRNewswire/ -- A10 Networks™, the technology leader in Application Delivery Controllers (ADCs), today announced beta availability for its high-performance SoftAX. Virtualization is at the center of Cloud Computing, delivering elasticity and the ability to scale with commodity hardware or software appliances. SoftAX is a software-based AX Series virtual machine (VM) with the same full range of AX Series appliance Layer 4-7 load balancing and application acceleration features, helping customers to rapidly scale cloud environments, horizontally or vertically, increasing performance on-demand.  

SoftAX enables high density ADC and load balancer deployments on a single platform, consolidating older load balancers or under-utilized Application Delivery Controllers. With SoftAX, A10 Networks delivers on its Cloud Computing & Virtualization Roadmap announced earlier in the year.

"A10's SoftAX beta downloaded easily and it took me only seven minutes to install. As an existing AX Series appliance customer, I was pleased to see all of the familiar features, and flexibility to deploy on demand with my already virtualized server environment," said Joshua Suggs, Database Administrator for Florence County. "With A10's new SoftAX option, we can now choose between software and hardware-based load balancer approaches according to our application requirements."

High-performance SoftAX Delivers Layer 4-7 Flexibility

Based on A10's AX Series Application Delivery Controller (ADC) appliances and Advanced Core Operating System (ACOS) architecture, the new SoftAX provides enterprises and service providers wide flexibility with the same full range of Layer 4-7 features and functionality as follows:

• 64-bit, shared memory, multi-CPU ACOS architecture
• Application Availability and Load Balancing
• Application Acceleration for Layer 4 to Layer 7
• Application Security, including DNS Application Firewall
• aFleX Layer 7 TCL Scripting for Deep Packet Inspection and Control
• aXAPI - REST-based XML API for Custom Management
• Virtualized Management
  • Role-Based and Partition-Based Management
• Global Server Load Balancing (GSLB)
• IPv4 & IPv6 Load Balancing and Management
• Full Web GUI and Industry Standard CLI
• High Availability

"Virtual Application Delivery Controllers, also known as SoftADCs, are an emerging trend in the Application Delivery Networking (ADN) market. While the core application delivery and load balancing functionality remains the same as with hardware appliances, the flexibility, speed of deployment and ease of distribution can redefine infrastructures and IT departments' usage of ADCs," said Dr. Jim Metzler of Ashton, Metzler & Associates and author of the Application Delivery Handbook. "With this new trend, organizations can deploy ADC appliances, SoftADCs, or increasingly both, according to their requirements."

The high-performance SoftAX delivers multiple gigabits of throughput per software ADC for industry-leading performance, delivering a robust solution for production applications and test or development environments. With SoftAX, customers reduce hardware costs, deliver on data center consolidation initiatives and enable deployment to compatible Cloud Computing providers.

"With our highly efficient, purposely tuned SoftAX, we are bringing all the advantages of our innovative Advanced Core Operating System architecture into a scalable virtual Application Delivery Controller," said Lee Chen, Founder and CEO for A10 Networks. "Customers with Cloud Computing, virtualization and data center consolidation initiatives will receive tremendous benefit to deploy our AX Series appliances and SoftAX, which deliver ease-of-use with the same features and functionality."

Availability

The high-performance SoftAX with multi-gigabit performance is now available for select beta.   Initial hypervisor support is for VMware ESXi , with versions for Microsoft Hyper-V, Linux KVM and Citrix XenServer to follow.  

About A10 Networks

A10 Networks was founded in Q4 2004 with a mission to provide innovative networking and security solutions. A10 Networks makes high-performance products that help organizations accelerate, optimize and secure their applications. A10 Networks is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices in the United States, United Kingdom, France, The Netherlands, Germany, Brazil, Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan. For more information, visit http://www.a10networks.com

SOURCE A10 Networks