• Home
• Why MBX?
• Success Stories

jetNEXUS Advances Global Appliance Deployment with MBX

The Customer:

jetNEXUS™ is the performance-to-price leader for load balancing, application delivery control and next generation traffic management solutions. Enterprises that demand high availability and performance for their mission-critical applications choose jetNEXUS appliance-based solutions to improve application performance. Launched in 2004, the ALB-X (Accelerating Load Balancer Extreme) and ETM (Enterprise Traffic Manager) network appliances accelerate the delivery of web applications and sites for some of the most successful organizations in the world.

Well known in Western Europe and the United States, the company’s growing brand awareness has led to expansion in new markets including Eastern Europe and the Middle East. In fact, 19 percent of all gaming-related internet traffic and 15.4 percent of all travel related internet traffic in the United Kingdom is processed by jetNEXUS¹.

The Challenge:

Load balancing and traffic management solutions are sophisticated and, as a result, generally expensive and complicated to implement. They reside in the network layer, which makes the execution challenging for even the most advanced data centers. They are also mission-critical and need high dependability to keep enterprise data or web traffic from coming to a screeching halt.

jetNEXUS wanted a way to deploy its solutions to provide peak performance and reliability without the complexity. To be viable, each solution also needed a price point to establish jetNEXUS as a formidable competitor in its product niche.

Niels Jaeckel, jetNEXUS Chief Technology Officer recalls, “The only clear way to create commercially manageable products without getting involved in a multitude of operating system variants was to deploy the solutions on an appliance.” At the time, the appliance model was relatively unchartered waters. Jaeckel knew designing for an appliance would solve the challenges of supporting multiple operating systems since an appliance is equipped to take advantage of open systems technology.

Another consideration for jetNEXUS was how to make its appliances’ appearance unique to work as a promotional tool for the company. Jaeckel adds, “We wanted the appliances to visually parallel the superior products we were delivering, but we had no experience in building hardware.”

The Solution:

During a trip to the US, Jaeckel read a trade magazine article about an appliance model that featured MBX Systems. At the time, MBX was a pioneer in the newly developing appliance market and several other systems integrators were starting to transition to this new product niche. Among the manufacturers he contacted, only MBX put together a standard platform for jetNEXUS that required minimal alterations and offered appliance branding to befit the company’s image.

According to Jaeckel, “MBX won the business by out-performing the competition. Other vendors seemed disinterested in our initial volume projections, built low-quality prototypes, or proposed a branded solution at a much higher price point. MBX addressed our issues and proved they could satisfy our platform and branding requirements. They configured a robust prototype system on the first pass and, by executing an efficient branding solution, shaved six months off our deployment date.”

In fact, jetNEXUS’ branding has emerged as a key marketing differentiator for the products. Compared to the predominant black box and simple logo on the bezel, jetNEXUS’ sapphire blue powdercoated appliance includes a glowing LCD panel on the faceplate – a feature that helps it stand out in the rack.

Jaeckel contends, “Our appliances are really a unique sales tool for our solutions. Often an engineer or even a non-technical person passes through customer’s data centers and the jetNEXUS system draws their eye – it is easy to spot and their interest is piqued. Once they find out what the appliance does for the network, it’s on their radar.”

Flexibility and ease of use are also compelling arguments for implementing the jetNEXUS appliance, even for the most advanced data centers. Jaeckel says, “Despite the buzz around software as a service (SaaS) and virtualization there is still a strong preference for the reliability of an appliance, even for our heavyweight customers. It detaches the customer from the responsibilities of support and maintenance. If anything goes wrong – whether it’s the code, hardware, or other maintenance issues – we’re the single point of contact for support. This is a very important commercial proposition beyond the financial ROI benefits for large corporations.”

Traditional load balancing or traffic management solutions won’t deal with network complexity in a flexible way. The reality is that the jetNEXUS appliances’ simple plug-and-play profile supports the company’s Ready to Run™ value proposition. After a pre-dialog with the customer, the jetNEXUS system ships preconfigured to the environment and ready to drop straight into the network. The system works right out of the box and the installer doesn’t need an IT or engineering background to make it operational.

Jaeckel explains, “Many of our customers are business people, not technical people. They may have started out as a retail shop and, because of the Internet, evolved into an online business. They could never manage a traditional ecommerce implementation without the aid or expense of a technical crew. In comparison, jetNEXUS’ solutions can go live in hours and will start accelerating the website by a factor of 80% or more. Telephone support is the extent of external assistance they might need.”

The Result:

Since the introduction of its appliances in 2004, jetNEXUS has experienced 100% year-over-year growth. Part of this growth is attributable to the company’s ability to deliver outstanding performance and value. In short order, jetNEXUS network appliances have elevated to best of breed and regularly replace more cumbersome and problematic systems.

Jaeckel says, “jetNEXUS appliances have been deployed to hundreds of customers and the number of systems returned for RMAs is literally in the single digits. What customers love most about our appliances is paying far less for a technologically superior product. MBX continues to serve as our research arm for the next generation our solutions. We rely on MBX to recommend performance upgrades and, as a result, help us stay on top of the latest technological advances.

“Appliances built by MBX literally pass the seven-foot drop test. There is so much care and consistency in the build process. Everything is buttoned up the right way. For example, the cable leads will not interfere with the airflow and cause overheating. Collectively over the four years of our appliance program, the failure rate is infinitesimal, even considering the typical jostling in transit.”

As jetNEXUS continues to expand into new markets, the company will take advantage of more MBX engineering and production services to standardize its platforms for direct shipping from MBX warehouses. MBX carries jetNEXUS stock in both the US and The Netherlands, allowing for expedited delivery in North America and Europe. This resource is a commercial and financial boon since it reduces jetNEXUS’ storage space requirements and the time and cost to deploy its solution. It also simplifies the logistics for handling jetNEXUS’ growing demand as its momentum grows in new markets.

About jetNEXUS

jetNEXUS™ develop next generation load balancing, application delivery control and traffic management solutions. Our solutions are scalable both commercially and technically to deliver outstanding performance and value from SME to Enterprise. With award winning technology supplied Ready to Run™ and accompanied by Tenacious Support™, jetNEXUS delivers outstanding results first time, every time. To learn more about jetNEXUS, visit www.jetnexus.com.

¹Source: Hitwise 2006

More Success Stories | Download