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SoftLayer

SoftLayer Debuts Dedicated Hardware Firewalls

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SoftLayer Technologies has introduced Dedicated Hardware Firewalls, available on demand and without service interruption through the company’s Customer Portal.

The new offering lets SoftLayer customers protect one, multiple, or all Cloud, Dedicated, and Virtual systems that share the same Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN), for just one price.

SoftLayer’s Dedicated Hardware Firewalls stand between an entire VLAN and the Public Network, analyzing and filtering all network traffic.

With the company’s Customer Portal, customers can configure the firewall settings for the entire VLAN as well as for individual computing systems. The Portal even provides a library of templates for applying protection rules and configurations for specific applications.

Current templates include mail and Web services, Parallels Plesk, and cPanel, with more to be added soon.

SoftLayer Booked $280 Million In Revenue Last Year

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SoftLayer Technologies has announced several key milestones logged in 2010, including:

* $280 million in revenue (40% cloud / 60% dedicated), following a merger with the Planet
* +38% EBITDA
* Growth to more than 26,000 active customers across 110+ countries
* More than 76,000 deployed servers

Also:

* Integration with the Planet is largely complete, with remaining projects on track to be done by 31 March, 2011
* New global corporate headquarters in North Dallas
* Cloud services and options including Build Your Own Cloud, Isilon IQ and Citrix Cloud Solutions
* Network POPs in Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Miami, New York City, San Jose, and Seattle
* New datacenter facilities in Dallas, Seattle, Washington D.C., Houston and San Jose (March 2011)
* Launch of Parallels Plesk Panel 10
* Launch of Nimsoft Network Monitoring solution

GI Partners, Management Buy Out SoftLayer Technologies

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SoftLayer Technologies, the  on-demand data center services provider, earlier this month announced a transaction in which its management team and GI Partners, a private trans-Atlantic investment firm, have acquired all of the equity in SoftLayer.

Since its founding, SoftLayer has revolutionized hosting through its unswerving commitment to innovation and automation. At a pivotal time in the industry, as increased connectivity, virtualization advances, and cloud service innovations dramatically reshape the landscape, SoftLayer is poised to continue playing a significant role in the industry’s transformation.

DH Capital served as exclusive financial advisor to SoftLayer in connection with the transaction.

SoftLayer Introduces Parallels Panel for CloudLayer Computing

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SoftLayer today began offering Parallels Plesk Panel as an optional service with CloudLayer Computing Instances. The extension of Parallels Panel to the company’s cloud computing solution gives SoftLayer customers even more control and operational efficiency for these exceptionally scalable environments.

Used by service providers and system administrators around the world, Parallels Panel automates and simplifies management and administration for dedicated, shared, and virtual systems. It provides a wide range of features for optimizing operations and maximizing return, including an easy-to-use interface, powerful backup and restore functionality, and robust tools for managing and reselling applications and services.

CloudLayer Computing provides cloud-based computing instances running enterprise-grade and open source operating systems delivered in as few as five minutes. These instances give enterprises massive scalability and can seamlessly integrate with SoftLayer dedicated servers, automated services, and other CloudLayer services (including CloudLayer Storage and CloudLayer CDN) to create a fully unified computing solution. Monthly billing is based on hourly usage or a monthly rate with no long-term commitment, providing an exceptional degree of flexibility.

SoftLayer Debuts CloudLayer Computing (Buzzwords, Anyone?)

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Today SoftLayer Technologies launched CloudLayer Computing, part of its new CloudLayer line of services. CloudLayer Computing is built on the Citrix XenServer virtualization platform, and brings enterprises massive scalability and unique opportunities for their IT environments. In as few as five minutes, customers can have cloud-based computing instances running enterprise-grade and open source operating systems.

CloudLayer Computing instances can be seamlessly integrated with dedicated servers, automated services, and other CloudLayer services (including CloudLayer Storage and CloudLayer CDN) to create a fully unified computing solution. Monthly billing is based on hourly usage or a monthly rate with no long-term commitment, providing an exceptional degree of flexibility. Other advantages include:

  • Image Library—Capture, template, and store images for accelerated provisioning and management
  • Ease of Use—Full access and control via Customer Portal and API
  • Full Virtualization—Virtualized networking, security, storage, and management optimizes “beyond the box”

In addition to offering on-demand computing instances, CloudLayer Computing lets SoftLayer customers build their own cloud computing environments from the ground up. SoftLayer dedicated servers can be paired with leading cloud solutions such as the Citrix Cloud Center (Citrix C3) to customize and manage environments ideal for providing online applications and other Web-based services.

SoftLayer Extends Offer With Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V

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SoftLayer extends its solution set to include virtualization with the release of Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V. Hyper-V can be ordered through the SoftLayer customer portal and provisioned automatically along with a server’s operating system or systems.

“Deploying Hyper-V is the first step in an extensive virtualization strategy that we are rolling out over the coming months,” stated George Karidis, Chief Strategy Officer. “The opportunities and advantages of virtualization are radically impacting the way we envision SoftLayer’s future and our fundamental approach to server and data center architecture.”