Fastly Unveils Its Managed CDN

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Fastly has unveiled its Managed CDN, which can be deployed on top of customers’ existing private networks, is dedicated solely for their use, and delivered as a fully managed service. Its CDN technology comes with Dynamic Site Acceleration, request collapsing, instant invalidation, real-time service provisioning, live-stream and on-demand video, image manipulation, real-time visibility, and security.

Managed CDNs are essentially CDNs running on private networks. They perform the same function as CDNs with greater security and control, allowing users to deploy dedicated hardware and points of presence (POPs) to regions where they are most needed. Managed CDNs also run on existing bandwidth, removing additional network usage costs associated with public CDNs.

Another major benefit of Managed CDNs is that they offer enhanced security. Because data is not shared, users can keep Transport Layer Security (TLS) Certificates within their data centers, control who has access to them, and securely distribute proprietary content. Managed CDNs can also be configured to achieve 99%+ cache hit ratios by doing away with space constraints, allowing content to remain in cache longer for better user experience and higher conversion.

Such CDNs and their attendant benefits used to be the exclusive preserve of established industry leaders, such as Google and Netflix, due to the prohibitively high costs and high level of sophistication and expertise required to deploy them, not to mention the time. Nowadays, it makes sense for companies that deliver large volumes of high-value, latency-sensitive content to global audiences to use managed CDNs, especially if they are already invested in private data centers and networks. Fastly notes that the top 300 content providers have plans to move into hybrid networks and that its Managed CDN will eventually account for approximately 20% of revenue in the coming years.

Fastly works with customers to design and manage their CDN end-to-end, helping determine POP locations and performance capacities and calculate storage capacity and cost vs. hit ratios. They also help customers select the optimal origin shield location and write custom VCL configurations to execute logic at the edge. Moreover, Fastly doesn’t charge a premium for SSL/TLS transactions, providing a free dedicated TLS certificate.

The major benefits of Fastly Managed CDN are:

  • High Performance and Predictability: Fastly’s Managed CDN offers dedicated caching of data on servers that optimally sized to enable near perfect cache hit ratios. The POP locations and capacities can also be flexibly deployed to fit customer needs and comply with regional laws. The Managed CDN can also leverage existing IP transit and interconnections to reduce bandwidth costs
  • Security: The Managed CDN stores TLS certificates within customer data centers and allows customers to terminate TLS connections at the edge of their private network, offloading encrypted traffic from origin servers. In addition, the Managed CDN benefits from existing security measures and policies
  • Fully Managed Service: Fastly takes care of the development, integration, and management of the CDN, providing dedicated support staff, customer service, training, and 24/7 monitoring, alerting, and incident response
  • Cost Savings: Fastly deploys its Managed CDN as-a-service for a fixed monthly cost per POP. It doesn’t charge for gigabytes per second or for requests/transactions per second. It also provides cost savings through improved cache ratios that reduce load on origin servers.
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