Riverbed launches SaaS accelerator and updates SD-WAN products

Riverbed has released a SaaS accelerator in addition to a number of updates to its digital platforms and SD-WAN products to improve both network and platform performance.

Riverbed SaaS Accelerator, a cloud-based SaaS performance management tool added to Riverbed's Digital Performance Platform, is intended to speed up the performance of SaaS apps by up to 10 times, according to the vendor. The accelerator, in combination with Riverbed's End User Experience Monitoring, enables users to directly measure and monitor the performance of SaaS-based enterprise apps in real time and then increase performance.

According to the Blissfully 2019 Annual SaaS Trends Report, companies will move as much as 80% of SaaS apps into a cloud environment by 2020. And, according to Gartner, SaaS represents the largest portion of the cloud market, with a projected growth of nearly 18% this year. However, Enterprise Strategy Group found that 73% of companies currently experience poor SaaS performance that negatively impacts business.

SaaS Accelerator is targeted to enterprises that require constant access to SaaS-based apps -- such as Salesforce, Box, Office 365 or ServiceNow -- but are located far away from the SaaS servers, such as when traveling or working remotely. Riverbed claims that the tool will improve both UX and business performance by eliminating app performance gaps and disruptions.

SaaS Accelerator can be activated on any Riverbed SteelHead or SteelHead Mobile solution running RiOS 9.8.1 or 6.1, respectively, and via SteelConnect Manager.

Updates to Riverbed's software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) products, SteelConnect and SteelHead, include the following:

• improved security and operational efficiency with advances in multi-cloud network automation;
• enhanced service chaining for on-premises and cloud-based security services;
• increased flexibility to deploy and manage SD-WANs in global environments; and
• integration with Zscaler's security platform.

Riverbed also updated its Digital Experience Management platform with the addition of an automated remediation feature. This feature aims to detect and resolve issues before they impact customer experience, which the vendor claims will lower IT costs and improve user satisfaction.