three with announced locations, one will be in the Boston area and two in Chicago. The primary benefit for users is expected to be reduced delays (latency) in the movement of data, Tarazi says. Packet allows customers to choose the location where their data will be processed—a policy consistent with its overall business model.
The company is known as a “bare metal” cloud service provider, which means that its customers don’t need to process their data under pre-set conditions, such as the operating system preferred by a cloud provider, Tarazi says. Packet users can specify the software, server type, semiconductors, operating system, and networks they want to work with, creating a customized data center in a public cloud, the company says. As a further inducement, Packet just announced that it can now automate deployment of a customer’s application in 60 seconds. Developers can use the system to test their software under various server configurations.
Tarazi says Packet customers include mid-sized enterprises and developers within companies, while telecom companies and big enterprises are starting to show interest. The startup is working with wireless companies to make 4G more effective for them, and to implement the faster, next-generation cellular technology 5G, he says.
With its new capital, Packet’s fundraising total now amounts to $36.2 million. Its Series B funding round was led by Third Point Ventures, and joined by Battery Ventures, JA Mitsui Leasing, Samsung NEXT, and earlier investors SoftBank and Dell Technologies Capital.
In June, Packet released a “State of the Edge” report created with industry partners Arm, the giant U.K. chipmaker owned SoftBank; Vapor IO, an edge cloud builder based in Austin, TX; edge delivery network builder Ericsson UDN; and Rafay Systems, which focuses on the deployment of applications to take advantage of edge computing.
The report describes layers of edge cloud-computing centers that could inch even closer to end user devices than the 50 edge data centers Packet now plans to build. These sublayers could include an “access layer,” which would collect data and analysis produced by nearby smart devices, and then selectively send some of that data to a higher “aggregation layer,” which might coordinate with other edge clouds on that level.
How can cloud service providers decide how close to the device edge of the Internet infrastructure they need to be?
“That’s a question for a lot of people; devices are getting more powerful,” Tarazi says. “The device and edge computing infrastructure will meet somewhere in the middle.”
Photo credit: Depositphotos
