# Riverbed Technology

> Riverbed Technology is a San Francisco-based IT software company that helps large enterprises see, optimize, and troubleshoot the digital experiences their people and customers depend on. Originally famous for the SteelHead WAN-optimization appliance, Riverbed has reinvented itself around AI-powered unified observability - stitching together network, application, and end-user telemetry, then layering predictive, generative, and agentic AI on top to spot problems and increasingly fix them automatically. Founded in 2002, taken private by Thoma Bravo in 2015 and again by Vector Capital in 2023, it serves thousands of global organizations across finance, government, healthcare, retail, and beyond.

- **Founded:** 2002
- **Headquarters:** San Francisco, California, United States
- **Founders:** Jerry Kennelly (Co-Founder & former CEO/Chairman), Steve McCanne (Co-Founder & former CTO)
- **Team size:** ~1,600 employees
- **Products:** Riverbed Platform (Unified Observability), Aternity (Digital Employee Experience), Alluvio IQ, SteelHead (WAN Optimization), Network Performance Management (formerly OPNET/AppResponse)
- **Notable:** Shipped the first SteelHead WAN-optimization appliance in April 2004 to Environment Canada, pioneering the WAN-optimization category., IPO on NASDAQ in 2006; became a category leader in application acceleration., Acquired by Thoma Bravo in 2015 in a transaction valued at roughly $3.5 billion.

## Products & services

- **Riverbed Platform (Unified Observability)** — A SaaS-delivered observability platform that unifies network, application, infrastructure, and end-user telemetry, correlated and analyzed with predictive, generative, and agentic AI.
- **Aternity (Digital Employee Experience)** — End-user experience monitoring that measures application and device performance on every employee endpoint, now with VDI Intelligence and autonomous AI remediation.
- **Alluvio IQ** — SaaS-delivered, AI-driven observability service that automates investigation, correlation, and insight generation across IT environments.
- **SteelHead (WAN Optimization)** — The appliance line that made Riverbed famous - accelerating application delivery across wide-area networks for branch and data-center traffic.
- **Network Performance Management (formerly OPNET/AppResponse)** — Full-fidelity packet and flow-based network visibility, monitoring, and diagnostics for hybrid and multi-cloud networks.
- **SD-WAN / SteelConnect** — Software-defined wide-area networking for connecting and managing cloud, branch, and data-center sites.
- **Riverbed IQ / AIOps** — Next-generation AIOps adding predictive anomaly detection, generative AI assistance, and agentic automation for incident prevention and remediation.

## Achievements

- Shipped the first SteelHead WAN-optimization appliance in April 2004 to Environment Canada, pioneering the WAN-optimization category.
- IPO on NASDAQ in 2006; became a category leader in application acceleration.
- Acquired by Thoma Bravo in 2015 in a transaction valued at roughly $3.5 billion.
- Reported 102% observability bookings growth in Q1 2025 following its AI pivot.
- Customers executed more than 250 million AI-driven automation steps in 2025.
- Named a Leader and Fast Mover in the 2026 GigaOm Radar Report for Network Observability.

## Latest updates

- **2026-05** — Defined the 'era of zero disruption' for digital employee experience with new Aternity innovations and autonomous AI capabilities.
- **2026-01** — Named a Leader and Fast Mover in the 2026 GigaOm Radar Report for Network Observability.
- **2025-08** — Launched new AI-driven intelligent network observability solutions delivering automated insights and higher performance.
- **2025-04** — Unveiled next-generation AIOps, adding predictive, agentic, and generative AI to the Riverbed Platform; reported 102% observability bookings growth in Q1 2025.

## Links

- Website: https://www.riverbed.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/riverbed-technology
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/RIVERBED
- GitHub: https://github.com/riverbed
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/RiverbedTechnology
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/riverbed

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/riverbed-technology
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-06-20