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Providing high availability for remote branch offices and lowering WAN costs have often been at odds, but Radware Ltd. says it has found a way to do both.
Radware, best known as a maker of high-speed Layer 4 to Layer 7 switches, this week is rolling out its LinkProof Branch device. The tool lets enterprises use lower-speed links from multiple service providers at remote branch offices to replace more costly T-1 lines while ensuring that bandwidth is available for critical business applications, officials said.
Because the device automatically fails over to a backup link and performs load balancing across the links, “you can replace an existing T-1 with two business-rate DSL [digital subscriber line] links. If you only look at connectivity costs, you will save over $8,000 a year for a branch office,” said CEO Roy Zisapel, in Tel Aviv, Israel, who based the savings on AT&T Corp. pricing. “With the broadband connectivity options enterprises have today, they can save a lot of money and guarantee the availability they need,” Zisapel said. If a site requires bandwidth above T-1 rates, that enterprise could avoid the cost of a second T-1 line or fractional T-3 rates and save more than $12,000 annually for a single branch, he said.
The device also provides virtual tunneling across multiple ISP links. When working in conjunction with a larger LinkProof multihoming device at a data center, the LinkProof Branch can ensure that “the best route is taken for a particular users request when you have multiple ISPs,” Zisapel said.
Although the LinkProof Branch is targeted at branch offices of larger enterprises, Radware reseller Enrique Krajmalnik sees greater demand among small and midsize businesses. “[SMBs] have mission-critical, Internet-based applications and use DSL. Those links have been problematic at times,” said Krajmalnik, president of The Illumen Group Inc., in Denver. “For a company to eliminate the downtime and lost revenue using a box thats a couple thousand dollars, itll pay for itself quickly.”
The LinkProof Branch, which provides eight 10/100M-bps Ethernet ports and supports an aggregate speed of 5M bps, also runs Radwares SynApps Application Aware Services software. SynApps provides bandwidth management for prioritizing different applications and security functions.
It is due this week starting at $4,250, with SynApps priced at $2,000.