TNT uses WAN optimisation to ease delivery of video

Logistics firm deploys Flash 'stream-splitting' technology from Bluecoat

Express delivery service TNT has deployed a new product from WAN optimisation and security specialist Bluecoat that allows it to broadcast Flash video without putting undue strain on its network.

Organisations such as TNT are increasingly using video content, including live broadcasts, to communicate with staff and external partners. This has an impact on network performance, especially if the content has to be streamed from the internet.

One way to ensure a consistent and acceptable service is to use WAN optimisation.

"Flash for an enterprise network is highly disruptive and difficult to control. It's difficult to provide a guaranteed level of performance across the network," said John Riley, senior network architect, TNT.

Riley explained that TNT's corporate communications department regularly makes live broadcasts to the entire company from its Amsterdam headquarters. This can lead to network bottlenecks as soon as five or more people in a smaller site with a 2mbit/s feed each try to stream the video at 512k.

TNT's Bluecoat solution uses stream splitting to get around the problem.

It works by only pulling the information in once, irrespective of how many users actually demand the content. The first client streams the content from the internet, but subsequent requests receive a split stream from the original.

"You could have 10 users at that site watching the same live broadcast, but it's only being pulled once across the WAN," explained Riley.

Flash is establishing itself as the industry standard for video content, according to Riley, as it provides more functionality than other formats such as Windows Media Player.

But until now Flash had been seen by proxy servers as general http traffic, meaning it suffered from quality of service constraints placed on internet traffic by the network. In addition, it had not historically been supported by stream splitting technology - until now.