Key results
- Mlytics services allowed ADLINK’s web pages loading speed increase from 5 minutes to a few seconds.
- Mlytics granted ADLINK access to multiple trusted China CDNs at a single traffic commitment.
- Mlytics enabled ADLINK’s Chinese users to update firmware at increased speeds.
About ADLINK
ADLINK is a leading technology provider in the embedded computing industry with its headquarter in Taiwan, and design and technology centers in the U.S., the Pacific Rim regions and Germany. Thanks to an extensive global distribution network, ADLINK’s products are currently available in over 40 countries across five continents.
Because of its global customer base, ADLINK is always looking for the best solution to provide products, services and support to its customers in the quickest way possible.
Challenge: Enhance web experience for global users and speed up loading times for China-based users
As a large player in embedded computing, ADLINK is required to regularly place large files (up to 500MB) of technical specifications and firmware on the website for their clients to download. ADLINK needs to cater to customers in all corners of the world, and therefore leveraged Azure’s global CDN. However, with a sizable customer base in China, only relying on Azure CDN did not suffice. Despite its strengths for global content delivery, Azure CDN faced challenges when trying to provide the user experience to China-based clients ADLINK was looking for.
Summary of ADLINK’s pain points:
- Slow download speed of firmware files : ADLINK periodically provides their clients with firmware update files of up to 500MB. Using Azure CDN, customers in China need up to 5 hours to complete the firmware update.
- Licensing requirements : To improve content delivery in China, leveraging a China CDN would be a suitable solution. However, to make full use of a China CDN solution, one has to obtain an ICP License from the Chinese Government. Securing this license can be a costly and time-consuming task.
- Discrepancy between expectations and performance : ADLINK entered a contract agreement with Azure CDN for their global content delivery. However, in terms of actual performance (especially for China) there seemed to be a discrepancy with initially anticipated results.
Mlytics offers a fast, flexible and highly integrated China Access solution
Benefits to ADLINK
- Highly integrated China Access Solution: Select multiple trusted China or China rim CDNs based on your needs and the availability of an ICP license.
- Affordable Multi-CDN Solution : Access multiple top-tier CDNs at the traffic commitment of only one. Traffic commitment may be divided over multiple CDNs.
- Easy one-stop management: Enjoy the flexibility to activate and manage multiple different CDNs based on business needs, from one intuitive platform.
- Enhanced performance via smart load balancing: Leverage the Mlytics Smart Load Balancing solution to ensure the best customer experience possible as traffic is routed to the best-performing CDN at any given time.
Solution integration
Mlytics suggested implementing a Multi-CDN solution combined with an ICP domain. For this particular case, Aliyun, Wangsu and ChinaCache CDNs were selected to increase coverage within the Chinese borders, and together with the Smart Load Balancing solution which routes traffic to the best-performing CDN, ADLINK’s Chinese web visitors were able to enjoy the best possible user experience.
During the POC stage, we selected Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Chengdu as test locations, and we used browsers to simulate the situation of normal users accessing the test sites. We mainly focused on the objects (URLs) which were selected by ADLINK and tested them separately. After which we compared the results with the data from Azure, ADLINK’s original CDN service provider.
Results
As the test results show, even though the enhancement for Chengdu was slightly lower than anticipated, the latency of particular web pages still improved. The most significant improvement can be seen in the product pages and the homepage where load times accelerated from 5 minutes to only a few seconds. As a result, waiting times shortened, directly benefiting user experience and satisfaction.
