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SoftLayer Delivers Rapid Scalability that Gives Game Developers the Competitive Edge

June 05
15:59 2012

Web Hosting – DALLAS, TX – Interruptions from outages, network lag and scalability issues caused by unpredictable usage patterns can mean “game over” in the competitive world of online game development. With a wide array of Internet-scale cloud infrastructure options – including dedicated, virtualized and managed servers – SoftLayer® Technologies has become the go-to provider to some of today’s top game developers. Online gaming companies such as Broken Bulb Game Studios, East Side Games, KIXEYE, Hothead Games and Storm8 rely on SoftLayer to provide a platform where they can develop, test, launch and run their latest games.

“Working with SoftLayer gave us the right mix of dedicated and pure cloud-based resources,” said Robert Nelson, CEO of Broken Bulb Studios. “We have a robust platform that can support our massive bursts in user adoption when rolling out new games. This is because we’re able to easily provision any and all IT resources while overcoming network latency issues, giving our users a great online experience.”

SoftLayer gives gaming companies like Broken Bulb Studios the ability to roll out cloud computing instances in minutes, or turn up dedicated servers in just two hours. This rapid response to their dynamic infrastructure needs allows gaming companies to have the capacity they need, when they need it, through an easy consumptive billing model. This way they can focus on their core mission of game development and control costs by only paying for the servers they need at any given time.

Online gaming revenue is estimated to reach $26.4 billion in 2015, more than doubling over the course of six years, according to DFC Intelligence. But to achieve this exponential growth, gaming companies must be lithe and quickly adjust to the changing needs for IT infrastructure to support game play. But building out complex, costly data centers, and hiring specialized staff, is not the most prudent strategy.

“Game developers do not have the time, operational expertise or resources to manage their own complex data centers because they need to focus on their core business – developing new games, launching before the competition and keeping players engaged,” said George Karidis, Chief Strategy Officer at SoftLayer. “Because we understand the high stakes of their operations, we’ve tailored our infrastructure-as-a-service offerings to meet gaming companies’ changing demands – from initial game release and explosive, overnight growth, to the variables that come with everyday play.”

In order to provide the exceptional scalability, performance and control needed for gaming applications, SoftLayer seamlessly integrates three distinct and redundant gigabit network architectures – public, private and data center-to-data center – into an innovative “network-within-a-network” topology. SoftLayer operates more than a dozen data centers around the world – including Dallas; Seattle; San Jose; Washington, D.C.; Amsterdam and Singapore. The data centers are connected via private, 10 Gigabit Ethernet point-to-point connections for seamless, high-speed and high-performance integration.

SoftLayer’s high-level customer service is also designed to meet the needs of the gaming industry.  “We’re typically working at odd hours, and it is difficult to have to wait for someone to get back to us for something as routine as turning up a server,” John Todd, director of operations at KIXEYE, citing SoftLayer’s easy-to-use, automated Web interface that allows KIXEYE to order and successfully turn up new physical servers on demand.

About SoftLayer Technologies
Headquartered in Dallas, SoftLayer operates a global cloud infrastructure platform built for Internet scale. Spanning 13 data centers in the United States, Asia and Europe and a global footprint of network points of presence, SoftLayer’s modular architecture provides unparalleled performance and control, with a full-featured API and sophisticated automation controlling a flexible platform that seamlessly spans physical and virtual devices, and a global network for secure, low-latency communications. With 100,000 servers under management, SoftLayer is the largest privately held infrastructure-as-a-service provider in the world with a portfolio of 25,000 leading-edge customers from Web startups to global enterprises. For more information, please visit www.softlayer.com or call 1.866.398.7638.

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The 'Web Hosting Blog' at FindMyHost.com was established to provide the web hosting industry with the very latest in news, technology, interviews, event information and more. About FindMyHost.com: Launched in January 2001 to protect Web Host Consumers and Web Developers from making the wrong choice when choosing a Web host. FindMyHost.com showcases a selection of web hosting companies who have undergone our Approved Host program testing and provides reviews from customers.

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