SoftLayer Reveals CloudLayer Storage and CloudLayer CDN

SoftLayer Technologies launched CloudLayer, a new line of cloud services that brings individuals and enterprises powerful options for dynamically scaling their IT resources, maximizing data accessibility, and optimizing their total cost of IT. It introduces CloudLayer Storage and CloudLayer CDN, with CloudLayer Computing to follow.

                               CloudLayer Storage

Built on SoftLayer’s core advantages and longtime leadership in automated services, the CloudLayer family provides advantages and capabilities not found with other cloud service providers. Besides operating as standalone solutions, every CloudLayer service can seamlessly interface with SoftLayer’s dedicated servers and automated services to create a fully integrated computing environment controlled through the SoftLayer Customer Portal or API. This provides unprecedented opportunities for interoperability and efficiency.

“The capabilities and vision that it takes to do cloud right is where SoftLayer has long proven its expertise,” said Lance Crosby, CEO of SoftLayer. “We aren’t jumping on the cloud bandwagon. We didn’t create CloudLayer to leverage our excess data center capacity. We developed CloudLayer because it’s a natural evolution of what we do. It gives customers the IT they need, when they need it, with all of the flexibility and efficiency of on-demand IT resources without any compromise in performance, security, or control.”

Additional CloudLayer benefits include:

• Pay As You Go or Monthly Packages: Monthly billing is based on hourly usage or monthly plans with no long-term commitment, letting customers optimize their return on technology investment by paying only for the resources they need and use. Hourly billing will be offered in the near future.
• Immediate Scalability: Services are added in real time to accommodate unexpected or temporary changes in demand, providing exactly the level of IT power and capacity as needed, when needed.
• Ease of Use and Control: Full control via SoftLayer’s Customer Portal and API provides streamlined, simplified management, as well as direct access to all SoftLayer services and tools.

CloudLayer CDN enables online service providers to deliver content to their end users faster and more efficiently via a network of 21 cloud-connected nodes running advanced software for organizing, storing, and streaming data. Rather than serving content directly from a host server, content is served from the node that is geographically closest to the end user. This minimizes the distance the data has to travel, mitigates network traffic jams, and decreases latency. CloudLayer CDN is available with Origin Pull or POP Pull delivery strategies, letting customers optimize their costs and end user experience.

Additional CloudLayer CDN benefits include:

• Content Management and Monetization Tools: Protects content access and digital rights to maximize return.
• Performance-Neutral Growth: Minimizes the impact that increased content demand makes on delivery speed.
• Broader Geographic Reach: Optimizes the speed and reliability of content delivery regardless of destination.
• High Quality Content and Rich-Media: Allows robust and richer web content without performance sacrifices.

CloudLayer Storage provides cloud-based data storage for storing, managing, and sharing data in any file format, with full access and control. It can be accessed through WebDAV or a Web 2.0 browser interface, as well as through native clients that SoftLayer has developed for Windows, BlackBerry, iPhone, and Windows Mobile devices. Data is stored to SoftLayer’s advanced StorageLayer solution, which integrates industry-leading technologies – including FTP/NAS, iSCSI, EVault, and others – into a unified storage environment for the ultimate level of security and reliability.

Additional CloudLayer Storage benefits include:

• Support for All File Formats: Upload, store, and share files of any type or size.
• Advanced Security Technologies: 256-bit AES encryption, SSL encryption, role-based permissions, share expiration, and more protect data during transmission and while stored.
• Streamlined Sharing and Linking: Collaboration tools allow users to securely share file access with vendors, customers, family, and friends without moving files from their stored locations.

“We worked very hard to design CloudLayer so that it provides capabilities that aren’t found anywhere else, with the ease-of-use and reliability that cloud services must have in order to be viable for enterprises,” said Nathan Day, CTO of SoftLayer. “With the extensive infrastructure and proprietary solutions that SoftLayer has built, and with modern virtualization technologies, CloudLayer truly delivers the cloud experience that the industry has been promising. We can’t wait to see what our customers accomplish with it.”