Brocade buys Cisco nemesis Vyatta

Network World - Brocade has announced its acquisition of Vyatta, a privately held maker of open source-based network software, for an undisclosed amount of cash.

Vyatta develops an open source network operating system that is relevant for multiple applications in network virtualization, software-defined networking (SDN) and private/public cloud computing platforms, Brocade says.

Brocade CEO Mike Klayko said, in a statement, that Vyatta will enable Brocade to pursue new market opportunities in data center virtualization, public cloud, enterprise virtual private cloud, and managed services, and bolster its overall software networking capability.

In addition to shipping open source-based networking software today, Vyatta is developing an "on-demand" network operating system designed for routing, security and VPN capabilities for physical, virtual and cloud networking environments. Brocade said it plans to use Vyatta technology to offer customers an end-to-end virtualized network infrastructure to speed application deployment and reduce development cycles.

It will also enable Brocade to extend its data center fabric and IP networking technologies into a variety of server hypervisor environments, the company said.

"We believe software networking to be a critical component in the next phase of network virtualization as enterprises are becoming increasingly virtualized and actively moving workloads to the cloud," said Ken Cheng, vice president of the Routing, Application Delivery and Software Networking Group at Brocade, in a statement.

Vyatta was founded in 2006 and its software is based on code developed by the eXtensible Open Route Platform (XORP), begun in 2002 as an open-source router software project. Vyatta's software runs on standard x86 hardware, and the company regularly claimed significant capital and operational cost savings over Cisco routers.

Brocade expects to close the acquisition by the end of the calendar year. Vyatta will be merged into Software Networking Business unit reporting to Cheng.