F5 ACI App Bolsters Joint Cisco Deployments with Streamlined Application Services

Combined solution provides F5’s industry-leading availability and security services on Cisco’s SDN platform for superior layer 2-7 performance

SEATTLE – Today F5 Networks (NASDAQ: FFIV) is introducing the F5 ACI ServiceCenter app to seamlessly combine L2-3 network connectivity with L4-7 application services within Cisco ACI environments. Available through Cisco’s ACI App Center, this integration app enhances visibility and control throughout the network and application stack to help customers accelerate application deployment within flexible, software-defined IT infrastructures.

F5’s participation in the Cisco ACI App Center gives joint customers the flexibility to deploy a full complement of services, such as Application Layer Traffic Management along with unparalleled performance and reliability. Further integration efforts are anticipated to yield the additional advantage of deploying F5’s expansive portfolio of application and security services within Cisco’s extensible ACI framework.

“Technology collaboration between F5 and Cisco is a clear win for joint customers,” said Calvin Rowland, SVP of Business Development at F5. “Building on previous partnership efforts, the F5 ACI ServiceCenter app gives organizations the ability to elegantly develop and enhance application and network deployments with a software-defined approach. More broadly, joint efforts like this are emblematic of the ways the two companies integrate capabilities for advanced automation and orchestration throughout the L2-7 stack.”

The F5 ACI ServiceCenter app takes advantage of F5’s simple and powerful Automation Toolchain capabilities to enable joint customers to deploy, configure, and customize application services in ACI environments quickly via declarative APIs. Together, F5 and Cisco engineering teams have built a number of use cases that utilize F5’s broad range of availability, networking and security services, making it uniquely beneficial, easier, and more effective for users to deploy and consume the companies’ technologies together.

Cisco’s ACI App Center is an innovative platform enabling Cisco’s technology partners to build ACI applications that simplify and enhance use cases using an open, extensible, and programmable ACI toolkit. The new downloadable app provides a direct, easy, and efficient way for mutual customers to consume application services across a variety of modern deployment scenarios.

“Open APIs have never been more important - they help customers utilize data, build partnerships, and forge new paths to innovation. The ACI App Center has been designed to foster collaboration and source innovation from user and development communities throughout our partner ecosystem,” said Thomas Scheibe, VP, Product Management, Data Center Networking, at Cisco. “Essentially, it provides an open path to add additional capabilities and services that maximize the value of software-defined networking, with the F5 ACI ServiceCenter app as a prime example. We look forward to additional integration opportunities with F5 to promote quicker application and service deployments, along with heightened visibility and versatile network performance.”

“F5’s existing integration with Cisco ACI had a significant role in our decision to purchase,” said Kazi Azizur Rahman, Chief Information Officer & Dep. Managing Director at City Bank, a premier financial services organization in Bangladesh. “Knowing that the two companies have a technology partnership as a foundation for future collaboration helps us to be confident in the longevity and effectiveness of our efforts around SDN.”

Additional Information

Bringing ACI and BIG-IP Closer Together—One Step at a Time – F5 Newsroom Blog Post

Availability

The F5 ACI ServiceCenter app is available for download from the Cisco ACI App Center at https://aciappcenter.cisco.com/. 

About F5

F5 (NASDAQ: FFIV) gives the world’s largest businesses, service providers, governments, and consumer brands the freedom to securely deliver every app, anywhere—with confidence. F5 delivers cloud and security application services that enable organizations to embrace the infrastructure they choose without sacrificing speed and control. For more information, go to f5.com. You can also follow @f5networks on Twitter or visit us on LinkedIn and Facebook for more information about F5, its partners, and technologies.

F5 is a trademark or service mark of F5 Networks, Inc., in the U.S. and other countries. All other product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

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