Softbank Broadmedia Corp is to offer content delivery network services in Japan using a network it built with Speedera Networks Inc, despite the fact that Softbank is also the largest Japanese reseller of rival services from Akamai Technologies Inc [AKAM].
Softbank, with over three million subscribers making it Japan’s largest broadband ISP, will use a Speedera-built CDN for its own broadband applications, and will shortly start offering these services to third parties.
The deal was originally conceived because Softbank needed to build a CDN platform on which to run yet-to-be-announced broadband applications it intends to launch soon.
But now the firm will offer access to the CDN, made up of Speedera’s servers deployed strategically on the Softbank network, to third parties. Three Softbank joint ventures, the Japanese versions of Yahoo, E*Trade and ZDNet, are testing the services.
The deal also calls for Speedera’s existing CDN to connect with the Softbank one. It is believed Speedera was chosen for being a closer fit technologically speaking with what Softbank was looking for.
Softbank subsidiary, CDN Services KK, is the largest reseller of Akamai’s CDN offerings in Japan, and was a 40-60 Akamai-Softbank joint venture until a year ago.
In June, Akamai signed a deal to build a CDN with NTT Communications Corp, the Japanese incumbent and Softbank’s primary competitor. That deal also called for the Japanese network and the global network to interconnect.
This article was based on material originally published by ComputerWire.
