KEMP Technologies, the leading provider of application-centric load-balancer solutions, announced that its LoadMaster virtual and hardware-based ADC offerings have been selected for the first time by Gartner for inclusion in the 2013 Magic Quadrant for Application Delivery Controllers.

Businesses of all sizes, as well as public sector entities like education, are not only undergoing transformations in terms of virtualized applications and infrastructure, but also confronted with ever-increasing demand for simpler and more cost-effective application delivery without sacrificing the highest performance and security standards.

Given that many organizations are resource constrained, they require a reliable ADC with proven best-in-class feature and functionality integration, and best practices expertise built in, to avoid productivity drains.

This scenario is playing out extensively in Africa says Desmond Pillay, Africa Sales Country Manager KEMP Technologies.

He says that as emerging markets grow in stature and in maturity, the demand for Application Delivery Controllers is on the increase. “Businesses that are investing in multiple platforms and collaboration to enhance operations are considering the value of ADC offerings. Cost efficiency, streamlined processes and procedures and the ability to tap into the advantages of applications are just some of the key considerations for ventures across Africa and other regions.”

Positioned above larger vendors like Fortinet and Brocade, Gartner highlighted KEMP’s security features such as SNORT-compatible Intrusion Prevention, distributed denial of service (DDoS) protection, and a value-added Active Directory pre-authentication endpoint safeguard for application access. In addition to security, KEMP’s virtual solution’s extensibility features – optimized for Microsoft collaboration apps like Exchange, SharePoint and Lync – were also cited as especially appealing to larger enterprises looking to accommodate incremental performance demands whereby hardware-based solutions traditionally have been the main option.

“As the most prominent application-centric vendor among more well-established, hardware-oriented, network-focused vendors, KEMP is honored to be recognized in the ADC Magic Quadrant,” said Ray Downes, CEO, KEMP Technologies. “As the first third party vendor with integrated load-balancing functionality for cloud apps resident within Windows Azure, the first ADC vendor to market with multiple hypervisor-compatible virtual ADCs, and a pioneer in truly scalable virtual ADCs, we’re delighted with Gartner’s validation of KEMP’s market momentum.”