News
Cisco Buys into Cloud Orchestration with Tail-f
The networking company bolsters its cloud portfolio by buying Tail-f Systems.
Cisco said it intends to buy Tail-f, a company known for providing multi-vendor network service orchestration. The deal is yet another new acquisition that Cisco hopes will bolster its position in the cloud and virtualization segments.
Tail-f's centerpiece is the Tail-f Network Control System, or NCS, which a centralized network interface for configuring network devices, applications and services. Services can be customized through a common modeling language and datastore where all service settings are stored and kept updated. Orchestration can be managed on both hardware and virtualized appliances.
According to the company's press release, the acquisition means that "Cisco's service provider cloud and virtualization portfolio will simplify and automate the provisioning and management of both physical and virtual networks."
Terms of the agreement include about $175 million in cash for all shares of Tail-f, with employees getting absorbed into Cisco's Cloud and Virtualization Group. The acquisition, after being cleared by regulators, should be completed at the end of the year.
Tail-f joins a growing number of cloud- and virtualization-related acquisitions made by Cisco over the last few years, including Collaborate.com in December, 2013, Composite Software (data virtualization) in July, 2013, and Meraki (wireless cloud networking) and Cloupia (cloud services) in November, 2012.
About the Author
Michael Domingo has held several positions at 1105 Media, and is currently the editor in chief of Visual Studio Magazine.