Riverbed Technology rvbd.ly , the leader in application performance infrastructure, today announced that it is one of the first partners to join the new Microsoft Azure Certified program.  In addition, Riverbed will now offer a Microsoft Azure-certified version of Riverbed® SteelHead™ CX for IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) clouds that can be deployed as an Azure virtual machine and managed by the Azure Management Portal. The combination of Riverbed SteelHead and Microsoft Azure allows customers to take advantage of the cost-savings and agility of the cloud, while optimising and accelerating the delivery of applications from Azure to business locations up to 33x faster, while using up to 97% less bandwidth.

“With the cloud gaining traction across a multitude of business functions, organisations need to run their applications in a hybrid environment and are turning to services like Azure,” said Paul O’Farrell, Senior Vice President and General Manager, SteelHead Products Group at Riverbed. “Regardless of where an application is hosted, it needs to perform to the satisfaction of the end-user. SteelHead’s optimisation and acceleration capabilities help deliver that ideal end-user experience, while enabling cost saving and higher productivity. We’re delighted to be among the first companies to kick off the program. Together Riverbed and Microsoft are delivering mission-critical applications across infrastructure-as-a-service faster than ever before.”
The Microsoft Azure Certified program makes it easy to find and deploy Azure-integrated solutions such as SteelHead. The first phase of this program is Microsoft Azure Certified for virtual machines and provides an onramp for Microsoft partners to take their applications to the cloud and integrate with the existing Azure customer base.

“Microsoft Azure is an end-to-end cloud platform for business and we’re excited to create an ecosystem for partners to expand their exposure to companies around the world who are taking advantage of the cloud transformation,” said Garth Fort, General Manager, Cloud and Enterprise Partner Marketing, Microsoft Corporation. “Eliminating the barriers between cloud development and operational management is critical. Riverbed is one of the first strategic partners to provide the cloud application performance infrastructure that improves the end user’s experience.”

Riverbed SteelHead and the Riverbed Application Performance Platform™
Riverbed SteelHead is the industry’s #1 WAN optimization solution that helps IT ensure optimal service levels for applications among data centers, branch locations, cloud networks, and end users. SteelHead, further, allows IT to prioritise delivery of mission-critical applications over the best available network with customised per-application service level agreements. SteelHead pioneered WAN optimisation in 2004 with unique innovations for application, transport, and data streamlining across the WAN and Internet to deliver the best end-user experience regardless of location while dramatically reducing network bandwidth costs. With SteelHead, enterprise and SaaS applications can be delivered up to 33x faster while using 97% less bandwidth.

Riverbed SteelHead is part of the Riverbed Application Performance Platform™, the most complete platform to enable organizations to embrace location-independent computing, so that business objectives – not technical constraints – drive how applications and data are delivered.

Forward Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements relating to the availability and performance of Riverbed products. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties, as well as assumptions that, if they do not fully materialize or prove incorrect, could cause our results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties that could cause our results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements include our ability to react to trends and challenges in our business and the markets in which we operate; our ability to anticipate market needs or develop new or enhanced products to meet those needs; the adoption rate of our products; our ability to establish and maintain successful relationships with our distribution partners; our ability to compete in our industry; fluctuations in demand, sales cycles and prices for our products and services; shortages or price fluctuations in our supply chain; our ability to protect our intellectual property rights; general political, economic and market conditions and events; and other risks and uncertainties described more fully in our documents filed with or furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission. More information about these and other risks that may impact Riverbed's business are set forth in our Form 10-K filed with the SEC for the period ended December 31, 2013, and our subsequent quarterly reports filed with the SEC. All forward-looking statements in this press release are based on information available to us as of the date hereof, and we assume no obligation to update these forward-looking statements. Any future product, feature or related specification that may be referenced in this release are for information purposes only and are not commitments to deliver any technology or enhancement. Riverbed reserves the right to modify future product plans at any time.