Cisco to Boost Cloud Technology with LineSider Acquisition

Cisco Systems Inc. said last week that it will purchase LineSider Technologies Inc., a Danvers, MA-based, privately-held provider of network management software whose OverDrive flagship product speeds up network provisioning.

Terms of the deal, which is expected to close by the end of January, 2011, were not disclosed.

The acquisition bolsters Cisco’s cloud lineup and also brings it LineSider’s engineering team, which will join the vendor’s Network Management Technology Group (NMTG) when the deal is finalized.

In addition, Cisco said that it expects the LineSider product to broaden its community of service management software partners.

LineSider’s technology “integrates both physical and virtual networks with a policy-based approach and makes networks more flexible and responsive to change,” said Jesper Andersen, Cisco NMTG senior vice president.

Linesider officials said that the company’s OverDrive addresses the large amount of operational time companies spend configuring networks to support virtual computing.

The LineSider software enables customers to organize network resources into a flexible cloud infrastructure that integrates with their existing IT tools and processes, prompting quicker network provisioning, accelerated service delivery and lower costs.