Video Demand Drives Expansion by SAVVIS

Citing strong customer demand, SAVVIS Communications says it has expanded its content delivery network (CDN), increasing capacity on the existing servers and storage, and expanding the formats it supports for on-demand and live streaming services. The expansion is another sign of the growth of Internet video, and the infrastructure to deliver it.

SAVVIS is a major player in the U.S. data center market. It's the largest tenant for Digital Realty Trust, leasing more than 1.1 million square feet of space in nine locations. The company said the expansion was the first phase of a two-part expansion of SAVVIS' CDN caching network that will effectively double the company's network capacity.

"SAVVIS' investment in expanding our content delivery network architecture is a direct result of rapidly growing customer demand," said Vince DiMemmo, Senior Vice President, Product and Marketing for SAVVIS. "This is enabling content delivery network services to evolve from simple caching and streaming into a new model that is enabling businesses of all sizes to capitalize on the monetization of digital content that is now available on a global scale."

The SAVVIS network started life as Digital Island, which was acquired by Cable & Wireless for $340 million in 2001. It was included in the C&W assets that were sold to SAVVIS through a bankruptcy deal in 2003.

SAVVIS said its new server storage subsystems will provide an increase of 400 percent over its previous systems capacity, eliminating bottlenecks due to capacity constraints on the existing servers and storage. Other important improvements include SSL enhancements that enable secure and non-secure caching traffic, and customer portal enhancements that include improved reporting features providing better visibility into traffic flow.