A William Blake poem was the inspiration for the name of server software
start-up Bright Tiger Technologies.
But the premise behind the company's clustering software, designed to avoid server-related accessibility and performance problems, may best be summedup by a quote from Henry David Thoreau's Walden: "Simplify, simplify."
Bright Tiger CEO Larry Moore says the network of servers and routers used to transmit data via the Internet and corporate intranets is illogical and unnecessarily complex, leading to slow response time, outages and application failures.
"The more complicated the network, the more likely something can go wrong," he says.
To help companies reduce costs associated with network performance woes, Bright Tiger has developed ClusterCATS, software that enables users to build and maintain server infrastructures called SmartClusters.
A SmartCluster is a group of two or more Web servers that work as a single unit. The servers all can be placed at one location on a LAN or anywhere over a WAN.
These servers send messages to each other regularly to determine which servers are working. The messages, sent via TCP/IP, also can be used to determine other servers' processing loads and the time it takes to send data from one server to another.
By constantly monitoring network resources, ClusterCATS is able to identify the nearest, least busy server storing the content, applications or transaction resources requested by a user.
This approach spares users from playing a form of Internet Russian roulette, in which a request for data may be randomly bounced to a server across the country through as many as 20 routers.
It also allows customers to build and maintain efficient, distributed Internet/intranet server infrastructures without spending big bucks on more servers, more WAN bandwidth and more personnel, according to company vice president of marketing Jim Hourihan.
The start-up was founded in June 1996 by former Iris Associates engineers Kathy Wilde (Bright Tiger's chief technology officer), Bill Adams, and Mary Walker.
Moore, a former executive at Lotus Development Corp., where he had worked with Wilde, came on board as Bright Tiger's CEO and president in 1997. Hourihan formerly was the vice president of marketing at Bay Networks, Inc./Wellfleet Communications, Inc.
ClusterCATS, which costs $9,995 for two servers, was released in October. The product currently runs on Microsoft Corp.'s Windows NT and Internet Information Server software. Plans for 1998 include adding support for Netscape Communications Corp.'s Web server in NT and Solaris environments.
Hourihan says the company faces three big challenges next year. The first is to expand market awareness and educate customers about ClusterCATS.
Second, Bright Tiger must position itself effectively against products offered by server and operating system vendors, such as Microsoft's Wolfpack and Cisco Systems, Inc.'s LocalDirector and DistributedDirector.
Finally, Bright Tiger must execute its plan effectively.
"And that's a big challenge facing all start-ups," Hourihan says.
