- Concentric Hosting
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Concentric 
Type Public Industry Web Hosting Founded 1995 Headquarters Herndon, Virginia, United States Key people Craig Collins, President of SMB & Hosting Products Web Hosting and Web Services Website http://www.concentric.com Concentric is a web hosting services company that entered the Internet Service Provider business in 1995 [1] and went public with an IPO on July 25, 1997. At that time, SEC filings showed declining losses and increased revenue growth, prompting the IPO [2](2). Acquired by Nextlink on Jan. 10, 2000, the two companies merged to become XO Communications, a subsidiary of XO Holdings, Inc. (OTCBB: XOHO). In 2004, Concentric returned to the market as an XO Communications service [3]. Concentric is based in San Jose, California.
Concentric claims to be the first web hosting company to have a patent for Clustered Hosting architecture [4]. Clustered hosting is a type of web hosting that spreads the load of hosting across multiple physical machines ("nodes"), increasing availability and decreasing the chances of one service (for example FTP or email) affecting another.
Contents
Products
Technology products
Concentric initially offered web hosting and web services using their Clustered Hosting platform, and then began to add additional products.
Developing referral business was seen as a way for web hosting companies to increase revenue without having to expand their direct sales force, so during 2005, Concentric added to the referral categories with new Affiliates and Commissioned Agents programs that complemented their existing Customer Referral and Private Label Reseller programs [5].
As the web hosting business became increasingly competitive, in 2006 Concentric provided increased bandwidth and disk space with more email addresses [6].
Perimeter Email Protection (PEP)
The rising volume of spam email prompted the development of new offerings in 2007 that provided email security, email filtering, and delivery back-up for businesses that own and manage on-premise email servers. Called Perimeter Email Protection (PEP), it is a suite of email server security applications that include tools to filter and authenticate incoming email before it reaches the customer's email infrastructure. By targeting spam and email based attacks at the perimeter, PEP claims to reduce email load and spam by 90 percent or more [7].
Microsoft Hosted SQL Server
In 2008, to complete Concentric's Windows .NET hosting platform capabilities, the Microsoft SQL (MS-SQL) Server was added to the Concentric Windows hosting platform [8]. For security reasons, Concentric did not support direct access to the MS SQL Server but instead offered secure Web-based administrative tools to assist in the database development process.
Concentric continued to introduce new products later that year, including services for small and medium-sized businesses that wanted all-in-one packages for web hosting, design, maintenance, and marketing [9].
Microsoft Hosted Exchange (HEX)
That was followed by the launch of Microsoft Hosted Exchange on the Concentric hosting platform, a hosted email service that combined Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Outlook[10]. It was made available as an additional email option for new customers, or a stand-alone or packaged Exchange product.
Managed Server
A recent product offering is the Concentric Managed Server[11], a fully managed server for businesses running on the Concentric Cloud Computing Platform.
Managed Backup
In June 2009 Concentric introduced their Managed Backup product[12], scalable data backup and recovery for small and medium size businesses. Concentric Managed Backup is an online, disk-to-disk backup service providing 24x7 data backup and recovery without requiring additional investment in network infrastructure.
References
- ^ Interview with Barbara Bannerman at HostSearch, Mar 2005
- ^ Concentric shows sharp growth, Jul 25, 1997
- ^ XO Communications Appoints Barbara Branaman as Vice President and General Manager of Hosting, Jun 7, 2004
- ^ US patent for Clustered Hosting
- ^ [1]
- ^ XO Upgrades Concentric Web Hosting Packages, Feb 7, 2006
- ^ Service provides network security and email protection, May 23, 2007
- ^ Concentric Adds Microsoft SQL Server to Windows Hosting Platform, Apr 21, 2008
- ^ Concentric Empowers Small and Mid-Size Businesses With Turnkey Professional Web Site Services, ay 27, 2008
- ^ Concentric and Microsoft Launch Hosted E-Mail Service for SMEs, Jun 16, 2008
- ^ Network Products Guide, SaaS (Software as a Service) and Cloud Computing, Nov 2008
- ^ Concentric Debuts New Hosted Backup Service on Cloud Computing Platform, Jun 15, 2009
External links
Categories:- 1995 establishments
- Web hosting
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