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Tinsley agreed with Gartner's assertion that the WAN optimization market would become increasingly crowded as smaller, startup-type players like Certeon came on radar, but said Silver Peak's strategy to focus on data center deployments using both physical and virtual product offerings was the right one.
"For 15 years, WAN op has been largely about acceleration in branch offices, but we're now seeing a lot more enterprise-wide deployments versus selective, band-aid type deployments," Tinsley said. "Large enterprises are really comprehending how WAN optimization can be used not just for a few branch offices greasing a few secondary wheels but also to be part of the standard networking plumbing. Not everyone is ready for that but the early adopters are here and it's going to become a mainstream market."
It's not Silver Peak's strategy to attack the channel bases of Riverbed or other WAN op players like Blue Coat, he explained, so much as it is to build additional resources into its existing channel partner base and leverage its various OEM partnerships, from EMC to Avaya. More VARs are cottoning to the model of selling subscription-based WAN optimization software, Tinsley said, where customers are offered an annual license instead of an up-front perpetual license.
"It's more attractive to some partners to buy a service from their supplier and then sell that service," he said. "It's been important to us to take advantage of alternative pricing models."
Silver Peak will stay focused on its core WAN optimization markets, Tinsley said, and not look to acquire or build in adjacent technology areas like Riverbed has done, at least in the short term.
"We're growing faster than the market at present," Tinsley said. "Other established players -- big networking companies like Cisco and Juniper -- have clearly underinvested in this space. It's a small business to people like them, but it's big business to people like us. We're comfortable that the trajectory we're on is the best strategy that matches up to large enterprise customers."
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