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Expand Networks Announces Four New Products for the Branch Office and Data Center

Posted on: Monday, 27 August 2007, 09:13 CDT

Expand Networks www.expand.com, a leading provider of application acceleration solutions over the Wide Area Network (WAN) and recently positioned in the Gartner's Leaders Quadrant for WAN Optimization Controllers 2006, today announced four new products in their Accelerator line in their hardware portfolio. The Accelerator 4830 and 4930 is targeted for small offices and/or branch offices, and the Accelerator 6830 and 6930 is designed for regional offices.

Coming off the heels of the recent announcement of their Compass 6.1 platform, Expand Networks' four new products will ship with newly added features offering top level reliability and flexibility for network applications: flow optimized TCP acceleration control, dynamic bandwidth adjust and Wide Area File Services (WAFS) transparency.

"Expand Networks is redefining a successful product line to keep up with the flow of data and IP traffic over the corporate networks," said Efi Gatmor, CTO, Expand Networks. "Consolidation in the branch office, server and data center continues to grow across the globe. By enabling more flexible WAFS implementations and adding features such as self-adjusting TCP acceleration and dynamic bandwidth adjustment, we are offering our customers the most robust and scalable options for their networks. For our customers this means an increase in concurrent optimized TCP sessions which now, at the low end, sit at 64,000 for the 4830 and 4930 and up to 128,000 for the 6830 and 6930.

"According to industry research, the typical branch office user has anywhere from 10-30 sessions open at the same time," adds Gatmor. "By Expand Networks increasing the capabilities of the concurrent session, we are able to give our customers the opportunity to support more users who are working with intensive applications in a collaborative environment, no matter where they are located. So, from a cost perspective, we are providing a competitively priced device that supports real-life office requirements and day-to-day working scenarios."

Accelerator 4830/4930

Ideal for the small office/branch office, the 4830 and 4930 offers application optimization for those most prominently utilized in that business environment including Oracle, SAP, Exchange, Citrix, RDP, Double-Take, Maximo, Snap-Mirror, MIMIX, BAAN and all other IP-based applications. Both also offer compression, Quality of Service (QoS), protocol optimization, security and encryption in a 1U dimension.

Additional specifications for the 4830/4930 include:

WAN Speed: 1 Mbps -- 6 Mbps

Concurrent Sessions: 64,000

Memory: 1GB

Connected Accelerators: 100 to remote accelerators

Hard Drive (4930 only): 160 GB

Number of WAFS users for WAFS Support (4930 only): 200

With greater than 80% of all offices located away from the main corporate Web site, network latency is one of the biggest contributors to office time being squandered. Expand Networks designed their new products to specifically take this on. In addition, Expand took notice of the primary requirements of industries such as government, federal offices, military and others that have regulations about storing data on hard drives for security reasons. The 4830 and 6830 do not come with hard drives and are ideal for deployment in these markets.

Accelerator 6830/6930

For the regional offices, the Accelerators 6830 and 6930 also have the same functionality in WAN optimization as the 4830/4930 offerings with compression and QoS, as well as optimizing the same demanding applications.

"We did a lot of market research and polled our customers on their key priorities," said Gatmor. "The answers that kept coming back were that they required a multipoint solution that has the ability to handle many concurrent TCP sessions and could optimize almost any application and protocol. All four of our new products, which run on the Compass 6.1 Platform, address these requirements."

Additional specifications for the 6830/6930 include:

WAN Speed: 2 Mbps -- 15 Mbps

Concurrent Sessions: 128,000

Memory: 2GB

Connected Accelerators: 200 to remote accelerators (350 for the 6830)

Hard Drive (6930 only): 500 GB

Number of WAFS users for WAFS Support (6930 only): 500

Key benefits of the 6830 and the 6930 include Flow Optimized TCP Acceleration Control, which employs the Vegas-style control algorithms and monitors the real-time state of each flow of data. The algorithms tune the acceleration precisely to the optimal rate -- never overloading the infrastructure. Consequently, this yields a consistent performance. The results are smooth and predictable flows with much fewer re-transmissions and a more reliable and efficient use of the entire infrastructure. Sectors that would realize this benefit include those deploying Satellite, DSL/Cable and Internet/VPN and MPLS.

Dynamic bandwidth adjust is another differentiator for the lot. Traditionally, WAN Optimization excels at mitigating congestion where the LAN and WAN meet, but what happens when there is congestion in the WAN cloud (Satellite, Internet, MPLS, etc.)? Through a real-time feedback mechanism, Compass will automatically adjust the bandwidth it sends to the WAN when congestion in the cloud occurs. This mechanism ensures the most reliable optimization of all IP traffic at all times, and can also help in environments with multiple satellite links and backup links for disaster recovery.

Rounding out the top line features for the 4930 and 6930 is the ability for transparent WAFS. A visible benefit is that with virtual server architecture, Expand's Compass Platform assumes the name of the branch file server (clients now effectively mapped to Compass) and WAFS optimization takes place. With transparent WAFS, clients already mapped to the central enterprise file server can also be optimized by Compass in the branch office without remapping. Compass is the only solution with the flexibility to be deployed both ways, and now ensures re-mapping clients is not needed.

The 4830/4930/6830 and 6930 are available immediately from Expand or select VARs and Resellers.

About Expand Networks

Expand Networks is the pioneer and leader in helping organizations simplify their IT infrastructure while delivering remote offices fast, reliable and secure access to networked applications. This results in improved user productivity and cost-effective IT management. Expand offers a multi-service integrated platform that ensures superior performance for any application over any network. From its headquarters in Roseland, NJ and its global locations, Expand Networks (www.expand.com) serves more than 1,450 enterprise customers including: American Express, Bacardi USA, BMW, Continental Airlines, Carr America, Colgate, Elizabeth Arden, Reed Exhibitions, Target and United States Department of Defense.

Expand Networks, Accelerator, Expand Compass, ExpandView are trademarks of Expand Networks. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Note About the Magic Quadrant

The Magic Quadrant is copyrighted October 2006 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission. The Magic Quadrant is a graphical representation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It depicts Gartner's analysis of how certain vendor's measure against criteria for that marketplace, as defined by Gartner. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in the Magic Quadrant, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors placed in the "Leaders" quadrant. The Magic Quadrant is intended solely as a research tool, and is not meant to be a specific guide to action. Gartner disclaims all warranties, express or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Source: Business Wire

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