Secure, High-Performance Content Delivery from Edge to Cloud
Built on a high-performance, secure global private network, F5 Distributed Cloud CDN enables rich digital experiences for end users. The F5 CDN supports modern content types, is built with an API-first architecture, and integrates with critical app security services to empower your organization as it pursues multi-cloud and edge-based app initiatives.
As App Delivery Moves Closer to the Edge, CDNs Must Evolve
Content delivery networks (CDNs) have a place in the application delivery and performance
ecosystem. Traditionally, their role has been caching and delivering static and dynamic
content via a global network of points of presence (PoPs).
However, organizations and end customers are looking for more. For the next generation
of application delivery, the goal must be to move workloads closer to where transactions
are taking place in order to reduce application latency. Applications and architectures are
evolving and so are the ways that organizations are thinking about application development
and delivery.
This evolution has necessitated a shift in app development and delivery that includes
apps residing at the “edge” via microservices and containers. These apps are increasingly
built using distributed architectures to accommodate growing application usage and ever-increasing performance demands.
As users’ availability and performance expectations change, organizations are choosing to run lightweight applications across clouds and on-premises at branch and satellite locations to complement CDN functionality and speed up data access and processing of critical telemetry at the edge—as opposed to long hauling back to an originating cloud or data center. This has created a distributed computing problem for many organizations as they grapple with the prospects of expanding some workloads further out to the edge or struggle with managing apps and workloads in an already complex, distributed set of environments.
Teams are attempting to improve application performance themselves by piecing together
a patchwork of solutions that include open source solutions and commercially available
offerings from public cloud and CDN providers. These teams continue to be burdened by:
- The complexity of deploying and operating apps across multiple public, private,
telco, and CDN environments. - The difficulty of maintaining a mismatched stack of app services and consistent
policies across apps and environments, including CDNs, cloud providers, and
on-premises solutions. - Code modifications or rewrites to support deployments at the edge required
by serverless applications and nascent edge platforms—leading to potential
vendor lock-in. - A lack of unified visibility across an ever-expanding ecosystem that includes on-premises, data centers, CDNs, and edge locations. Lack of flexibility and agility in serverless architectures often limit deployment of workloads to the providers’ footprint (the providers’ CDN, edge or network PoPs), tying virtually all compute and deployment to one providers’ infrastructure.
Top of mind for organizations when they deliver their apps globally is availability, security, and performance. CDN plays a major role in that effort for apps of all kinds, but organizations need a more advanced (or evolved) set of capabilities and approach for modern app delivery— which F5® Distributed Cloud CDN and the platform’s rich set of services delivers.
Update Your Network for Modern App Delivery across Environments
Modern app delivery is about more than just serving up content. It is about security, multi-cloud and edge connectivity, APIs, and the ability to deploy microservice-based apps anywhere. It is also about availability and performance.
Leveraging the tools and technologies in the F5® Distributed Cloud Platform, F5 Distributed
Cloud CDN provides an integrated set of capabilities to address an organization’s application
availability, security, and performance needs.
With the F5 Global Network, a high capacity and performant backbone, organizations can
efficiently deliver their applications globally. With F5 Distributed Cloud CDN, you can:
- Connect environments, apps, and workloads. A unified service mesh across
multi- and hybrid-cloud environments includes a centrally managed distributed
proxy, service discovery, networking, and security services for modern
and legacy applications.
- Secure apps and workloads with multi-layered web app and API protection.
Enforce appropriate security policies and protect against automation and unwanted
traffic, malware, and other threats anywhere with a unified set of app security
controls, including web application firewall (WAF), DDoS mitigation, API security,
and bot defense.
- Run critical microservices and Kubernetes-based workloads wherever required.
Leverage a complete range of services to support and automate app and infrastructure
deployment, scaling, and lifecycle management with centralized orchestration.
- Optimize static and dynamic content delivery for web apps and workloads. Content
delivery is paired with primary and secondary authoritative DNS services and intelligent
load-balancing via F5’s global anycast network, including built-in DDoS protection.
- Monitor all distributed apps, services, and infrastructure. Get end-to-end app visibility
and reporting of security services, network, app performance, and system health.
The F5 Distributed Cloud Platform consolidates CDN and other services to support all apps
across monolithic and microservices-based architectures to simplify management and
upgrade security and network connectivity. You’ll be well-positioned to support all your
modern app needs, regardless of where you are in your digital transformation journey.
Conclusion
F5 Distributed Cloud CDN is part of the broader Distributed Cloud Platform that offers SaaS-delivered app services and critical capabilities to support modern, multi-cloud, and edge-delivered apps. This platform enables your organization to accelerate app delivery, optimize performance, and reduce operational complexity across operations, engineering, architecture, and network teams.
The F5 CDN can be purchased with the Distributed Cloud Platform, with Distributed Cloud
WAAP, or as a standalone service, and offers options for integrating with companies’ existing
infrastructure. Customers can try CDN for free before deciding whether to purchase
