Content Delivery Network Blog | CDN EvangelistThe blog for CDN professionals

ATLANTA – April 28, 2011 ─ Internap Network Services Corporation (NASDAQ: INAP), a provider of intelligent IT Infrastructure services, announced that it will open a new data center in Los Angeles to serve increased demand for premium colocation. This facility will be Internap’s eleventh company-controlled facility in its eighth North American market and continues the company’s strategy to build a geographically diversified platform of premium data centers serving customers’ high-performance IT Infrastructure needs. The new Los Angeles facility will feature Internap’s route-optimized Performance IPTM service and will deliver best-in-class performance and availability across a portfolio of enterprise IP, CDN, colocation, managed hosting and cloud services.

Located in the South Bay, just 6 miles from Los Angeles International Airport, Internap’s new Los Angeles data center will include 55,000 square feet of premium net sellable data center footprint over time. The state-of-the-art facility will leverage modular designs and the latest power and cooling technologies to deliver power densities of up to 12 KW per cabinet to economically support long-term customer growth. The facility will minimize energy consumption and environmental impact through green data center practices such as a high-efficiency Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) system, a cooling system that maximizes outside air for free cooling, reclaimed building materials and sustainable operational best practices. It will also feature a full range of customer amenities, including fully equipped office areas, technical workspaces, dedicated customer work environments and a full-service customer lounge. The first phase of approximately 15,000 net sellable square feet is expected to open in 2Q 2012.

“According to Tier 1 Research, the utilization of colocation space available in the Los Angeles area exceeds 90%,” said Mike Higgins, senior vice president of data center services at Internap. “Explosive growth in demand from the city’s media and entertainment, aerospace, technology, petroleum and finance industries has outstripped limited data center supply. With the addition of Los Angeles to our portfolio, Internap is able to provide these growing enterprises with data center space that can be tailored to their specific IT Infrastructure needs – from colocation, managed hosting and cloud services to high-performance enterprise IP and Content Delivery Network services – and can quickly scale to support their business growth requirements.”

Underscoring the company’s commitment to green data center objectives for efficiency and sustainability, Internap plans to submit the data center for Green Globes certification, LA County Green Building Standards compliance, LEED certification and an Energy Star rating.

About Internap Data Center Facilities

• Internap’s data centers offer a highly reliable and scalable IT Infrastructure to deliver and store content, data and applications. With more than 40% of Internap’s company-controlled footprint deployed within the last three years, these facilities feature the latest innovations in data center design, including scalable power and cooling density and environmental efficiencies.

  Customers can access Internap’s Performance IP service, which connects to all of the major Internet backbones globally and leverages patented technology that analyzes network performance characteristics – such as available bandwidth, delays and packet loss – to ensure that Internet traffic is routed over the best path 100% of the time.

• Along with SAS 70 Type II compliant practices, the facilities also offer multiple layers of security with 24/7 on-site technical support as well as proactive monitoring by engineers in Internap’s redundant Network Operations Centers.

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Now with CNAMES, Cloud Files Can Easily Integrate Into Web Sites

SAN ANTONIO – April 27, 2011 – Utilizing its relationship with Akamai, Rackspace^® Hosting, the world’s leading specialist in the hosting and cloud computing industry, today announced the addition of CNAMES which further extends the capabilities of its overall Cloud Files product offering.

Rackspace Cloud Files provides businesses of all sizes fundamental tools for building new applications in the cloud. Cloud Files, built on OpenStack’s Object Storage technology, is enterprise ready, highly scalable and serves content through its Akamai-based Content Delivery Network (CDN) offering.

“Rackspace is extremely excited with continued Cloud Files momentum. This year, we have been adding new features nearly every week and the CNAMES functionality really rounds out this incredible offering. Our relationship with Akamai has certainly been a key component to our success with this offering,” said Scott Gibson, director of product management for big data at Rackspace.

“Leveraging our globally-distributed Internet platform, Rackspace Cloud Files with Akamai Integration provides high performance and instant scale of content stored on Cloud Files, which can help businesses lower their IT costs, boost sales, and improve user adoption and productivity,” said Willie Tejada, vice president, application and site acceleration for Akamai.  “Akamai is excited to be working with Rackspace, and their leading cloud computing solutions, to drive content delivery in the cloud.”

Rackspace Cloud Files is backed by Fanatical Support^® and now includes such features as:

• CNAMES –Integration of Cloud Files content into customer’s branded Web site URLs.
• Edge Purge – Allows customers to edit or delete content on the edge server
• HTTP Compression – Process allowing compressed objects to be downloaded quickly
• SSL Delivery – Or https, encrypts customer’s data in transit as it goes through the CDN, allowing content to remain encrypted all the way from the origin servers out to the browser
• Container MetaData – Metadata can be attached to objects and now containers in order to categorize them and mark them with any sort of data
• Large File Support – Allows customers to use multipart uploads so now companies can store videos, HD movies, very large backup files, etc.
• Extended TTL– TTL or Time to Live has increased from 72 hours to 50 years!

At SXSW in March, Rackspace kicked off the King of the Apps contest, where developers competed to  produce the best application developed on Rackspace Cloud Files.  The round one champion was SnapAppointments, a convenient way to book appointments online.  SnapAppointments will take on the next competitor in round two of the contest on Tuesday, May 10 at Interop. Las Vegas.

“As a Rackspace King of the Apps winner, our application proved to be using Rackspace Cloud Files in innovative and useful ways,” said Brock Holzer, co-founder of SnapAppointments.  “The new features in the next generation Cloud Files make the solution even easier to use. Since debuting at the King of the Apps contest at SXSW our company has grown like wildfire and we look forward to growing our company on Cloud Files.”

Companies interested in getting crowned as Rackspace’s next King of the Apps can submit their application online athttp://www.rackspace.com/cloud/information/promotions/kingoftheapps/

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Leading Irish media company taps Mirror Image for video streaming across web and mobile properties

TEWKSBURY, MA – April 27, 2011 – Mirror Image® Internet, a leading provider of edge computing, streaming and content delivery solutions powered by a patented global network, today announced that leading Irish media company, Communicorp,  has selected Mirror Image to support live media streaming to its Web properties as well as mobile devices such as iPhone, Nokia  and Android handsets.

With 40 stations in eight countries throughout Europe, Communicorp Digital’s content strategy is focused on providing interactive programming on multiple platforms including traditional airwaves, the Web and mobile. The company uses Mirror Image’s multiprotocol streaming service and Media Management Platform to stream live, on-demand and user-generated video across its stations as well as monetize content through advertising. Currently, Communicorp is delivering content to iPhone, iPad and Nokia devices with plans to roll out Android and Windows 7 support in the future.  In addition, Mirror Image’s Media Management Platform enables the company to embed advertising directly into their video streams.

“We recognize that in today’s media environment, being able to adapt quickly to change is imperative. That is why we are committed to extending our reach beyond traditional channels to enhance audiences’ listening and viewing experience,” said Aidan McCullen, Head of Digital for Communicorp. “It was extremely important for us to find a content delivery partner that was willing to experiment with new platforms such as mobile and who could support our pursuit of the most cutting-edge content channels both now and in the future. We found that with Mirror Image.”

The Mirror Image multi-protocol streaming service works with a broad range of standard H.264 encoders and file formats. Users do not need to employ specialized encoders or specially pre-formatted content for iPhone, Android or any specific device consumption. This capability enables businesses to streamline and simplify encoding workflows and eliminate the burden of storing and managing files in multiple client-specific formats.

Mirror Image’s Media Management Platform is an easy-to-use, end-to-end brandable video solution that enables businesses to monetize videos through advertising integration. With the Media Management Platform, news, media, advertising and retail companies can do massive video deployments in hours instead of months.

“Traditional broadcast companies are going through an unprecedented transformation in today’s web and mobile driven market,” said James G. Hart, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Mirror Image.  “Communicorp is a great example of a company that has taken a proactive approach to evolving its content strategy with its incorporation of mobile and user-generated content. We look forward to working with them to bring new experiences to audiences across Europe.”

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Octoshape Details New Delivery Opportunities for Web TV
Business Wire (press release)
The company has begun writing the next chapter of content delivery, having already extended Multicast technology far beyond the limits of private enterprise networks to the far reaches of the public Internet. The Octoshape approach is more scalable and …
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National Association of Broadcasters Selects Highwinds to Stream "NAB Show Live"
PR Newswire (press release)
LAS VEGAS, April 11, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Highwinds®, a leader in content delivery, network and IP services, today announced that the National Association of Broadcasters has selected its content delivery network (CDN) for the third consecutive year to …
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GC Could Boost Level 3′s Global Ambitions
Light Reading
The deal would combine Level 3′s global content delivery network (CDN) capabilities with Global Crossing’s much larger international footprint and with its unique assets in one of the world’s fastest-growing markets — Latin America. …
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ATLANTA, April 11, 2011 /PRNewswire/ – Internap Network Services Corporation (NASDAQ:INAP), a leading provider of IT infrastructure services, today announced that it is integrating itsAccelerated IP (XIP™) service into its global Content Delivery Network (CDN). The integration further distinguishes the performance of Internap’s CDN by significantly improving the delivery of video streaming and web content to a wide range of user devices, including mobile phones, tablets and PCs, resulting in up to four times faster streaming and downloads. Internap will showcase a demo of its CDN with XIP acceleration for the first time at the NAB Show(National Association of Broadcasters) in Las Vegas on April 9-14, 2011 at booth SU9502F1.

The ability to deliver online content has become a critical business differentiator for broadcasters and other organizations, the success of which is often directly reliant on the performance of the CDN. Internap’s CDN with XIP optimizes the customer experience by accelerating content delivery all the way to the end user device and across a greater number of network layers than traditional CDNs, resulting in a notable and immediate performance improvement.

The CDN with XIP optimizes the customer experience, speeding delivery of both dynamic and static web content, such as streaming video, game downloads, SaaS applications, ecommerce, software patches, and .pdf and website image files, among others. It also drives significantly improved "first-frame" delivery and faster progressive downloads as well as reduced buffering and fewer frame drops.

"In a world where content is only a click away, customers expect the delivery and viewing of that content to be fast, seamless and without delay or interruption – to the device of their choice," said Laura Mayo, vice president of business development at Internap. "High-definition, long-form content is a classic example of the kind of content that will see immediate benefit from our CDN and XIP acceleration. And the performance benefits continue to increase in line with file size and amount of latency, providing dramatically improved delivery for users accessing rich content on high-latency connections."

XIP technology builds on the existing benefits of Internap’s global Performance IP™ network, which leverages numerous carrier networks worldwide and its patented Managed Internet Route Optimization™ (MIRO) to deliver IP traffic over the fastest route 100% of the time. The combined result is end-to-end network, application and content optimization, leading to the highest levels of performance, availability and ultimately, end user satisfaction.

XIP is being integrated at Internap’s worldwide CDN locations throughout Q2 2011. Internap CDN customers will receive XIP acceleration as part of their regular service with no additional fee.

About Internap’s Accelerated IP (XIP)

• Launched in April 2010, Internap’s XIP is the first IP accelerator to be delivered as a service from "source to destination," resulting in improved performance that directly impacts the end user.
• XIP addresses web traffic performance issues associated with Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), allowing web-based content and applications to load faster and maintain accelerated performance.
• Provided as a service, XIP eliminates the need to deploy hardware and software at regional data centers or on the client side.

About Internap’s CDN

• Used by customers worldwide across a range of industries – including media and entertainment, online retailers, education, healthcare, financial services and others – Internap’s CDN provides a complete solution for live and on-demand video streaming. Its "set and forget" capabilities allow organizations to focus exclusively on content creation by simplifying and streamlining the workflow for content uploading, transcoding, management and reporting.
• Internap was rated a top CDN in 2010 by industry analyst firm Current Analysis, receiving a rating of "outstanding" in the performance, SLA and support categories.

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Cotendo Announces Patent-Pending Cloudlet(TM) Platform, the First CDN …
SYS-CON Media (press release)
SUNNYVALE, CA — (Marketwire) — 04/11/11 — Cotendo, an innovative fast growing Content Delivery Network (CDN) and Value-Added Site Acceleration services provider, announced today the availability of its new Cloudlet™ Platform, the world’s first …
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PacificHost Adds Free CloudFlare CDN to Hosting service
HostReview.com (press release)
PacificHost, a leading provider of Linux based, cPanel-based Hosting solutions announced earlier today a key partnership with CLoudFlare Inc, a new and innovative Content Delivery Network. CloudFlare provides high performance and pro-active security to …
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