HydraWEB Technologies Delivers HydraWEB Load Manager; Non-Stop Load Balancing Appliance Assures Continuous Content Delivery.

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 10, 1996--HydraWEB Technologies announced today its HydraWEB Load Manager 1000 Series, a new-generation network appliance designed to deliver non-stop load balancing and remote resource management for high-traffic Web clusters.

The HydraWEB Load Manager works as a front-end to a cluster of Web servers to provide real-time, intelligent load balancing, transparent remote management of the entire HydraWEB-managed server cluster, and automatic backup by a standby 1000 Series unit. HydraWEB is capable of handling over 50 million connections per day -- well in excess of the capacity of a T3 connection.

HydraWEB can transparently manage a cluster consisting of an unlimited number of Web servers. HydraWEB now includes an intelligent agent for Windows NT-based Web servers as well as UNIX Web servers.

"HydraWEB offers Internet and Intranet managers the tool they need to operate multi-server clusters to provide high-volume, highly reliable services," said Doug Urner, Web Performance Manager at Berkeley Software Design, Inc.

"The Internet community has responded very enthusiastically to HydraWEB's intelligent approach to non-stop Internet resource management," said Raj Sharma, President of HydraWEB Technologies.

"HydraWEB is designed for Web sites where reliable content delivery is critical and remote management of server clusters and content is a major concern. Our new HydraWEB Load Manager delivers continuous Web and Internet content, simplifies installation, and reduces network management requirements."

HydraWEB offers two new and unique capabilities: Logical Content Clustering and Remote Console. By deploying HydraWEB, the Web site manager can transparently expand clusters to handle high-traffic periods and make the most efficient use of Web server resources. Additionally, the Web site manager can deliver continuous 7x24 Web services without the attendant costs of round-the-clock, on-site administration.

HydraWEB's unique Logical Content Clustering enables the Web cluster to handle the same work with fewer Web servers than are required by conventional load balancing approaches. By allowing the Web site manager to allocate server resources according to average or mean anticipated traffic, Web site content may be replicated across a logical cluster and transparently scaled during high-traffic periods.

To guarantee performance levels, server resources from an overflow HydraWEB cluster can be dynamically allocated to a fully loaded logical content cluster. In this way, the aggregated bandwidth of all managed servers may be allocated on an "as needed" basis. This ensures continuous content delivery even during peak load periods.

HydraWEB includes Remote Console, a powerful tool for remotely managing Web servers from a single console or a dial-in connection. Administrators can work together to manage the day-to-day operation of the HydraWEB server cluster, diagnose problems, and if needed, remotely reboot HydraWEB and managed servers from the PROM level.

In the event of failure of a managed server, hits are immediately diverted to other servers in the HydraWEB cluster, and an alarm is sent to administrators who can Telnet or dial-in into the Remote Console and after proper authentication take necessary actions to fix the problem.

HydraWEB generates a range of reports to measure hits by time, by cluster, or server and includes graphical monitoring of Web server activity, traffic trends, and other server statistics. Secure remote management supports both software and hardware token-based authentication. HydraWEB provides an audit trail and time stamps for all events and administrative activities.

To ensure that the HydraWEB cluster is always available, the HydraWEB Load Manager supports a hot spare option so that a backup HydraWEB Load Manager can immediately take over without rebooting if the primary unit goes down. Other advanced HydraWEB features include SSL support for commerce-enabled sites and hit routing for persistent connections server-specific content delivery. In addition to HTTP, HydraWEB also supports HTTPS, SSL, FTP, NNTP, SMTP, Gopher, and Telnet services.

HydraWEB's intelligent load balancing is far superior to router-based approaches that consider only response-time averages. HydraWEB's Intelligent Server Agents ensure top performance by actually monitoring each server's throughput to determine bandwidth availability in real time. These Intelligent Server Agents use MultiPlexor Load Average (PLA) rating to perform an in-depth analysis of the managed server that considers CPU utilization, memory kernel tables (processes, open files, I/O, and other parameters), Web server latency, and network performance.

Internet Service Providers familiar with hosting multiple Web sites will immediately appreciate HydraWEB's performance and security advantages over first-generation methods of cluster management, such as load-balancing DNS or round-robin DNS. HydraWEB presents the outside world with a single IP address per URL which securely conceals the exact number of servers and IP addresses supporting each Web site.

Pricing and Availability

HydraWEB Load Manager is available now starting at $7,990 for a four-server configuration. HydraWEB systems software is also available to qualified customers.

About HydraWEB Technologies, Inc.

Headquartered in New York, HydraWEB Technologies is an emerging supplier of new-generation Internet appliances and services that optimize the availability, reliability, and manageability of public and private networks. HydraWEB Technologies can be reached at PH: 212/809-5900, E-mail: [e-mail], or Web: http://www.hydraweb.com

CONTACT: Zaballos & Associates for HydraWEB Technologies

Zee Zaballos, 408/425-1581

E-Mail: [e-mail] or [e-mail]