FAST FACTS
overview
Whether you’re delving into
IT initiatives such as private
cloud computing and IT
consolidation, or just trying to
provide a high level of service
to your business application
users, you may increasingly
find gaps in your ability to
manage network and application
performance. Riverbed®
Cascade® gives you actionable
information for network
analysis and optimization,
application performance
management, acceleration of
IT consolidation projects, and
security compliance. It’s the
cost-effective, comprehensive
visibility you’ve been looking for.
10 Reasons You Need Network
and Application Visibility
10. Resolve performance issues. When IT problems occur, you don’t want to learn about them from
your users. Cascade observes your network’s normal behavior and uses powerful analytics to alert
you proactively to any performance or availability problems. It’s an agentless, non-intrusive solution
to application performance and end-user experience monitoring that reduces the mean time to
resolution (MTTR) of IT incidents by an average of 83%, according to a study by IDC*.
9. Find problem sources. Applications like voice, video and social media bring business benefits, but
also the risk that an application or user will slow down the network. Cascade provides a businesscentric view of your infrastructure, with performance metrics per application, location, user, and
much more. To identify the source of a problem, you can drill down from Layer 7 application
information all the way to low-level addresses and ports, with just a few simple clicks.
8. Consolidate with lower cost. Whether you’re consolidating a few servers or entire data centers,
you need a cost-effective discovery method for your current environment. Unfortunately, most
discovery and dependency mapping tools on the market are expensive to purchase and configure.
In contrast, Cascade is an agentless solution that easily identifies application, server and client
dependencies, and helps you understand the impact of your proposed changes.
7. Move to the cloud faster. Cloud computing
projects can significantly reduce hardware,
software and support costs by consolidating
data center and branch office IT resources
into a smaller number of cost-effective
locations. The sooner you move to your
new cloud environment, the more money
you save. Cascade’s enterprise-wide visibility
allows you to accelerate your cloud project by
quickly mapping your IT infrastructure and its
usage patterns.
“Adding the Cascade product to
our network infrastructure really
let us know what traffic is on
our network. We are glad to see
Riverbed leading the convergence
of application acceleration and
performance management.”
—George Rosato, vice president of Information
Systems & Technology, CONSOL Energy Inc.
6. Find underutilized servers. Every server
on your network adds to your hardware and
software maintenance costs. If you could quickly find which application servers are the least-utilized
and who is using them, you could re-evaluate their business justification, and move to consolidate
or virtualize these applications.
5. Optimize your WAN. Consolidating computing resources into the data center may result
in slower performance, increased bandwidth costs and security issues. A WAN optimization
solution is an effective way to resolve these concerns. Riverbed provides multiple levels of
integration between Steelhead® WAN optimization appliances and Cascade including the
ability to find the best optimization candidates, quantify the benefits, and correctly analyze
application performance across optimized and non-optimized sites.
4. Protect your network. With full visibility into your network and proactive, real-time problem
alerts, you can deliver security to your organization as well as performance. Cascade can detect
threats or intrusions across the network, helping you achieve compliance with regulatory
requirements and IT mandates.
*“Achieving Business Value with Network and Application Visibility”, by Lucinda Borovick and Randy
Perry, IDC, April 2010
FAST FACTS: 10 Reasons You Need Network and Application Visibility
3. Increase staff productivity. Cascade’s accelerated problem resolution has a measurable effect
on IT staff productivity. According to IDC, Cascade customers enjoy average annual productivity
benefits of $6,632 per 100 users, and the average duration of help desk calls is reduced by 87%. Call
duration is shorter because the help desk staff can identify the source of a problem and estimate
the resolution time.
2. Reduce downtime. When your critical network connections or business applications fail, every
minute counts. IDC finds that Cascade customers have 34% fewer downtime incidents per month,
and the average incident duration is cut by 51%. This results in a measurable increase in end-user
productivity.
1. Save money. With Cascade, the savings quickly add up. Not only does its superior ease-of-use
deliver staff productivity gains, but customers have also saved millions of dollars per year on server
and tool purchases from vendors of less-efficient solutions. To deliver the performance that your
business needs, resolve IT issues faster and enable strategic IT projects, you won’t find a more
cost-effective solution.
About Riverbed
Riverbed Technology is the IT performance
company. The Riverbed family of wide area
network (WAN) optimization solutions
liberates businesses from common IT
constraints by increasing application
performance, enabling consolidation, and
providing enterprise-wide network and
application visibility – all while eliminating
the need to increase bandwidth, storage
or servers. Thousands of companies with
distributed operations use Riverbed to make
their IT infrastructure faster, less expensive
and more responsive. Additional information
about Riverbed (NASDAQ: RVBD) is available
at www.riverbed.com.
Riverbed Cascade: Assessing and Accelerating IT Performance
Managing a corporate network is an increasingly challenging task. Network teams are expected
to monitor and predict application performance, maintain security and manage external service
providers. New high-bandwidth applications, cloud computing, branch office consolidation, WAN
optimization and other innovations cause traditional network management tools to show their
age, and most tools have become expensive to install and maintain.
Riverbed Cascade provides enterprise-wide network and application visibility with a full set of
application-centric, site-centric, and business-centric views. While Cascade can coexist or integrate
with a variety of other IT management solutions, it will likely become your first line of defense
against application performance problems, because it is:
•
•
•
•
2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009
Real time – Provides up-to-the-minute performance information
Non-intrusive – Uses no server-side agents or synthetic transactions
Proactive – Powerful analytics provide alerts even before users call to complain
Comprehensive – Enabled for all networks, both optimized & non-optimized
An independent ROI study of Cascade customers, conducted by IDC in April 2010, found a
remarkable three-year ROI of 364% and a payback period of just 5.5 months. Find out how
Cascade and other Riverbed technologies can accelerate IT performance and save money for your
organization.
Want to learn more about Network and Application Visibility?
Contact Riverbed, the market leader in WAN optimization, for more information on the products
and solutions that are right for you. Thousands of companies world-wide trust Riverbed to achieve
cost savings and deliver strategic advantage over the competition. Visit www.riverbed.com for
more information.
Riverbed Technology
199 Fremont Street
San Francisco, CA 94105
Tel: +1 415 247 8800
Fax: +1 415 247 8801
www.riverbed.com
Riverbed Technology Ltd.
Farley Hall, London Road
Binfield
Bracknell
Berks RG42 4EU
Tel: +44 (0) 1344 401900
Riverbed Technology Pte. Ltd.
391A Orchard Road #22-06/10
Ngee Ann City Tower A
Singapore 238873
Tel: +65 6508-7400
Riverbed Technology K.K.
Shiba-Koen Plaza Building 9F
3-6-9, Shiba, Minato-ku
Tokyo, Japan 105-0014
Tel: +81 3 5419 1990
© 2010 Riverbed Technology. All rights reserved. Portions of
Riverbed’s products are protected under Riverbed patents,
as well as patents pending. Riverbed Technology, Riverbed,
Steelhead, RiOS, Interceptor, Think Fast, the Riverbed logo,
Mazu, Profiler, Atlas and Cascade are trademarks or registered
trademarks of Riverbed Technology. All other trademarks used
or mentioned herein belong to their respective owners.
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