Sandpiper Networks Offers a Solution to Web Waiting Game

More than 1 million computer users signed on to the same Internet Web site earlier this month to catch the live broadcast of the Victoria’s Secret Spring Fashion Show in New York.

The rush of log-ons illustrated at least two things: The general population will turn out in large numbers to see models showing off lingerie. And, as advanced as the Internet is, it is not equipped to handle such a high level of traffic. Congestion caused the Victoria’s Secret site to jam, resulting in technical problems for many users.

Officials of Sandpiper Networks of Westlake Village were not surprised at the results of the Internet event. While they may not be experts on fashion, they do know something about Internet overload.

Last September, Sandpiper introduced to the mass market a subscription-based distribution service for Web site operators that limits congestion and the technical problems and long waits associated with it. Last week the company announced the creation of a technical advisory board to help the firm keep pace with the fast-changing Internet industry.

Sandpiper’s distribution service, called Footprint, allows clients such as E! Online to avoid congestion when delivering information over the Internet, by diverting content from congested channels to lines based close to the receiver. The system sends information through 30 “content distributors” set up on 14 networks.

“We believe it is a real need of content providers to have a partner help them with delivery of information from the Web site to the ultimate consumer,” said Sandpiper President Leo Spiegel.

“With something like the Victoria’s Secret [fashion show] or the Starr report, [Internet] traffic will change radically--the question is how do you create an infrastructure that will handle all of these spiky events,” Spiegel said.

With Footprint, he said, Web site operators can “offload a lot of requests and we can distribute them on their behalf.” Clients of Sandpiper Networks are provided with software to connect with the Footprint system.

“We help solve the problem of World Wide Wait,” Spiegel said. “Our clients are large sites, small sites. It could be the tiniest company with the most popular Web site or a huge company with the least popular Web site and everything in between. . . . They don’t want to worry about how to deliver those bits of information on a network essentially nobody owns.”

Sandpiper Networks was founded in 1996 with private funding by Brentwood Venture Capital, Media Technology Ventures and Mission Ventures. Footprint is the company’s initial service. It was introduced to a limited group of clients in late 1997.

Spiegel said an advisory board has been in the plans since the company was formed.

“We wanted to make sure we were focused as a start-up, had launched our service and got the customers,” he said. “In many ways these people have been sort of informal advisors to the company already.”

The technology advisory board includes Robert Berger, president of Internet Bandwidth Development; Rob Bowman, former director of backbone engineering for Exodus Communications; Benjamin Chen, chief information officer of iXL Enterprises; David J. Farber, a telecommunications professor at the University of Pennsylvania; Michael Whelan, vice president of technology for NBC Interactive Media; Bill Yundt, vice president of networking for WebTV Networks; and Dick Edmiston, senior vice president of research and development for EarthLink.

Edmiston sees the board functioning as both a matchmaker for business opportunities and as an advisor on technical issues.

“The Internet environment is a moderately complex environment,” Edmiston said. “We can help get people together with one another and we can advise [Spiegel] and his people about the trends we see in the Internet.”

The current trend, he said, is a demand for faster and faster connections at a time when congestion is often slowing things down.

“The backbone providers like MCI WorldCom, Sprint, GTE, their traffic has been doubling every three months and it’s where we couldn’t get additional capacity in place fast enough--it’s defied all rational expectations,” Edmiston said. “It’s been going on for four or five years, and it’s all directly or indirectly attributable to the Web.”

But that could be just the beginning, he said. So far, 56K modems are the standard for high-speed connections. But super-high-speed cable and DSL (digital subscriber line) modems are becoming more common and that means more information traffic testing the limits of Internet lines.

“Cable and DSL modems are about to skyrocket,” Edmiston said. “What’s going to happen is, if we don’t have innovative technology, people are going to be disappointed with their new high-speed toys. And if they are going to be online all the time, they are going to be pulling down a lot more traffic.”

The Internet is out of hand already, Spiegel said.

“One of our clients, on Friday and Saturday, gets very little traffic on its Web site and in general the ‘net is not as congested on those days,” he said. “But during the week, early in the day, late in the day, the same page that gets downloaded in five seconds on Friday and Saturday, takes 25 seconds. With our technology, even in the worst of cases, we can download in eight seconds.”

Spiegel said he wouldn’t be surprised to see other companies follow the lead of Sandpiper Networks.

“A lot of companies are providing the technology and services to help solve the problems of World Wide Wait,” he said. “You have better routing and switching technology, more fiber and pipes and satellites. The solutions are coming together.”