For the last two years Vyatta has been
offering a Linux based alternative to proprietary routing technology.
Today Vyatta is upping the ante with a new release, Vyatta Community Edition
4 (VC4). The new version scales up the Linux network operating system to
10GbE and adds new functionally that complements its scale upstream.
Vyatta isn’t being shy about who the competition is, and is taking direct
aim at networking industry Goliath Cisco for a piece of the multi-billion
dollar routing market.
“We’re breaking out from being router software to being an open network
operation system where routing is just one of the features,” Kelly Herrell,
CEO of Vyatta, told InternetNews.com. “On one hand, we’re scaling out
in terms of the functionality with more security and more traffic
management. It’s also about scale up and scale down. With this release, we go
all the way down to DSL and all the way up to 10GbE.”
Herrell explained that Vyatta is introducing features in VC4 that will
benefit both service providers and enterprise users alike. Vyatta has
brought in a more advanced command line interface (CLI) called Fusion CLI.
The new CLI enables users to handle all of their networking and Linux
commands from one place, making both traditional network and Linux admins
more comfortable with the interface.
“We have really enhanced routing scalability and performance,” Herrell
noted. “We are now very comfortable going up against the 7200 class of
Cisco product which is an important product for the service provider arena.”
Additionally Vyatta has improved role based access control and WAN load
balancing. The balancing feature allows network administrators to load
balance traffic across multiple broadband links at the same time which
provides the benefit of increased network availability and performance.
As opposed to Cisco, which has its own branded hardware equipment, Vyatta
for the most part relies on hardware partners including Dell and IBM, though
Herrell indicated that Vyatta is being deployed on all types of hardware
vendor platforms.
“We don’t see a definitive brand on the hardware yet, actually we see the
opposite, everything from HP to IBM to Dell,” Herrell commented.
Vyatta does have a small form factor branded appliance with it own Vyatta
514 router, and Harrell noted that other Vyatta branded hardware may well be
forthcoming. Dell has been a hardware partner for Vyatta for more than a year, though to date
it has been Vyatta reselling Dell hardware as opposed to the other way
around. Herrell did state however that in addition to Dell, Vyatta is now
also orderable on IBM hardware through an IBM reseller.
Herrell noted that Vyatta has been able to dispel the misconception that you
need to have specialized hardware to for networking by using x86 based
technology. Cisco,
Juniper and Alcatel-Lucent all have their own respective proprietary ASICs (application specific
integrated circuits)
Herrell himself is no stranger to Linux, Herrell
was the SVP of Strategic Operations at embedded Linux vendor MontaVista Software before joining Vyatta. There are some things are the same at Vyatta and some things that are different.
“The main thing is making sure you leverage and contribute back to the
community,” Herrell said. “It’s something MontaVista is good at and we’re
good at too.”
The business models are a little different though in that MontaVista is an
embedded software play whereas Vyatta is an end user facing product. Herrell
noted that the way you package and make Vyatta’s technology easy to use and
service is what he needs to deliver day in and day out.
Vyatta is a venture backed enterprise and it’s not yet clear at this point
if the exit strategy involves an IPO.
“The smartest thing you can do is run your business for high growth and
profitability,” Herrell said. “Until you get to the point you should keep
your head down and hands on the wheel, because if you try and manipulate a
company for a short term exit you can make bad decisions, so we don’t do
that.”
