Speedera’s storage optimization

Speedera Networks last week announced a policy-based storage management service to enable companies to place popular streaming media and downloadable content on a globally distributed network of servers – closer to users.

Speedera’s Smart Storage Manager uses a configurable policy-based management system that customers use to define which applications deserve the best performance and which can be handled with less expensive storage. Customers also get the ability to automatically identify the most frequently requested content and pre-position it on the largest possible edge server for higher quality and performance delivery, Speedera says. Less popular content would be stored and delivered from lower-cost, centralized servers.

Site administrators could use Smart Storage Manager to set policies for controlling the delivery of their content, including a popularity threshold that must be reached before a file can be moved from central storage to edge storage locations. Speedera also allows site administrators to set a maximum quota of edge storage that can be used for specific content to keep costs lower.

Speedera argues that its storage management service provides a level of content control other content delivery network services don’t. Speedera competes with Mirror Image, Cable & Wireless and Akamai, among others, in terms of CDN services.

Smart Storage Manager optimizes the use of the edge storage quota by migrating content files to only those edge locations where the content is frequently requested. For example, edge storage in Paris will typically be populated with different files than edge storage in New York, since the top 10 songs requested in Paris will be different from the top 10 songs that users are requesting in New York.

Speedera says Smart Storage Manager would work best for content sites with large streaming media and downloadable files, such as media and entertainment companies owning massive media archives.