Proficient Networks: A start-up to watch

Error 404--Not Found

From RFC 2068 Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1:

10.4.5 404 Not Found

The server has not found anything matching the Request-URI. No indication is given of whether the condition is temporary or permanent.

If the server does not wish to make this information available to the client, the status code 403 (Forbidden) can be used instead. The 410 (Gone) status code SHOULD be used if the server knows, through some internally configurable mechanism, that an old resource is permanently unavailable and has no forwarding address.

Error 404--Not Found

From RFC 2068 Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1:

10.4.5 404 Not Found

The server has not found anything matching the Request-URI. No indication is given of whether the condition is temporary or permanent.

By Ann Bednarz
Network World, 04/29/02

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Company name: Inspired by a Digital Island customer who sought a full-time person to engineer routes for his company and was advised to find someone "proficient in the art of internetworking."

Origin: Founded in February 2001 by four former Digital Island executives and engineers.

Funding: $6 million in one round closed in May 2001.

Key investors: Canaan Partners, El Dorado Ventures, and private investors Ed Kozel, a former Cisco CTO, and Ron Higgins, former Digital Island CTO.

CEO: Co-founder Allan Leinwand, who has been CTO at Telegis Networks and Digital Networks.

Product: Network Policy Engine NPE1010A appliance.

"Route control" is a buzzword among service providers and their enterprise customers these days ÷ and Proficient wants to cash in on it. The concept of route control is simple: to override Border Gateway Protocol path selection in ISP networks by determining the best path based on factors such as latency and congestion. Proficient takes things a step further than other route control vendors by factoring in business objectives. Rather than simply tuning Internet connections based on performance, Proficient can distinguish among applications and customers. High-priority traffic might move across fast, reliable connections, while lower-priority traffic might travel slower, less-expensive routes. The San Francisco company accomplishes this through its Network Policy Engine appliance. Deployed at an enterprise site, the appliance collects network traffic information, tests network paths and routes traffic accordingly, distributing loads across diverse provider networks.