User 449726

Optimizing the WAN Optimization Space

Anil, need to get some of your facts straight.. Citrix entered the WAAS, WDS market with the aquisition of OrbitalData NOT NetScaler. NetScaler provides optimization but for Web applications mainly and it is not a true WAAS appliance like the WANScaler which is the product that Citrix aquired from OrbitalData..
Riverbed has always been at the forefront of the WAN optimization market.. CISCO, F5 and the rest have basically been playing catch up with them (Riverbed).. so stating that they are "emerging" as the market leader is kind of an understatement..

An important statement that you need to comment on in your article is the fact that although the concept of WAAS is understood and pretty much a general term for methods of caching/compression, TCP optimization, etc.. the methods of achieving these are NOT standard so.. if there where to be consolidation in the space from a technical perspective it would be an integration nightmare.. since products are NOT compatible with each other.. so if CISCO where to aquire Riverbed (as you potentially state in your article) then they would have to re-engineer their products to make them compatible or provide a compatibility mode which would make the product work the "Cisco" way or the "Riverbed" way.. This would mean a slow intro of new products.. .. Unless they want to basically eliminate the competition..