Caching software vendor Varnish Software, has announced the latest version of its software, Varnish 6.0.
The solution – used by everyone from Sky to Tesla – provides native TLS support and is capable of offering an industry-first certified 150Gbit/s for each server, allowing customers to serve more data without the need to spend extra on additional resources.
The performance of content delivery networks (CDNs) has become increasingly important as video delivery and ultra-HD video streaming makes up a rising proportion of internet traffic. The rollout of 5G networks and FTTP will put even greater emphasis on the need for reliable delivery networks and the need to push network performance to ensure both live video and video-on-demand are served up smoothly without buffering.
Not only does this help both service providers and media firms meet customer expectations of lower latency and faster speeds, but high performance caching and edge computing are key to enabling service providers to introduce new premium service offerings and superior experiences.
Managing as much traffic at the network edge as possible relieves the burden on origin servers and will keep traffic flowing. Varnish says that their latest solution makes this easier and more cost-effective.
Varnish Software’s customers include Hulu, Emirates and Tesla and its technology is used by more than 9 million websites worldwide. Its solutions combine the flexibility of open-source technology with enterprise-quality robustness to speed up media streaming services, accelerate websites and APIs, and enable global businesses to build custom CDNs.
“Our aim is always to optimise our software to work efficiently with the platform our customers use,” explained Espen Braastad, VP Engineering, Varnish Software. “The marriage between architectural efficiency and network scale is essential for the success of any modern content delivery platform. Achieving more than 150Gbit/s while still maintaining reliable, low-latency content delivery means our customers can stay ahead of the curve and have more than enough capacity for their current and future needs.”
Omnisperience’s view
Video traffic – streaming in particular – along with online gaming account for a huge proportion of internet traffic. In the UK alone, a third of content is now streamed, for example. The industries supporting these experiences are the ones that service providers hope will help them monetise their investments in new networks such as 5G and FTTP. But it’s not just gamers who are pushing the limits of today’s networks – premium live sports streaming is also gathering momentum. A recent study by Verizon, for example, found that 63% of customers who currently stream live sports are willing to pay for a more personalised user experience. As with many things though, willingness to pay is tightly coupled to the experience delivered. And video traffic can be particularly demanding, as not only does it demand very low latency, but it can be unpredictable – especially when it comes to live events. This is even before the industry has added extra layers such as augmented or virtual reality. To successfully monetise these opportunities, service providers need to consider how they can deliver the type of network experience expected by their customers, and at a cost profile that makes it attractive to all.