Concentric Offers Traffic Peak Insurance

Internet provider Concentric Network Corp. said Monday
it will launch a new insurance service aimed at content providers
concerned about Web site traffic spikes.


The Concentric Peak Protection service will give content,
software distribution and media providers who need data center and network
diversity the ability to add Web site bandwidth capacity on-demand. The
service works by dividing traffic between Concentric hosting centers and
other server locations.


The service is geared toward companies that don’t
want to depend on a single hosting provider, Internet service provider or
to establish their own data centers. Concentric said customers want to be
able to adjust network capacity and be protected from bottlenecks that can
result from having only one network provider.


Peak Protection was developed by employing technology from Inktomi Corp. in conjunction with
Concentric’s Distributed Server Environment (DSE) platform. The Peak
Protection servers use Inktomi’s Traffic Server caching solution and is
used throughout the Concentric network as a multiple-customer infrastructure.


DSE and Peak Protection is able to bring content closer to end users,
which results in faster Web site downloads. DSE and Peak Protection
distributes traffic between customer servers and Concentric’s Peak
Protection caching servers located in numerous Concentric data centers.


Customers who sign up for the service use a secure Web interface to request
the amount of bandwidth they want during a projected peak. Peak Protection
then automatically builds up a copy of the content on all of Concentric’s
Peak Protection servers based on where the Web viewership and content
demand exists.


This is accomplished without customers moving servers from the primary data
center or hosting provider. The Peak Protection service acts as a single
server acting as multiple, geographically diverse and redundant servers.


Peak Protection will be available on Jan. 27, 1999, to Concentric-hosted
customers and to companies whose primary Web servers are
hosted elsewhere. Customers can reserve Peak Protection bandwidth from 500
Kbps to 10
Mbps, with the ability to burst up to 100 Mbps.


Introductory pricing for Peak Protection includes a $1,000 set-up fee, a
monthly recurring charge of $700, excluding bandwidth charges which start
at $550 a month.


“Concentric has developed a truly leading-edge service by listening to
customer needs and by building on our robust network and hosting
infrastructure,” said Henry R. Nothhaft, chairman, chief executive officer
and president of Concentric Network.


“Content, software distribution and media providers
want — and need — protection from performance degradation due to
unbalanced network traffic flows, from outages caused by their primary
hosting or network provider, or simply from unexpected traffic surges, all
of which significantly jeopardize a Web site’s performance and success.”


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