Valve Leverages Highwinds CDN for Steam Platform

Content Delivery for Valve Reaffirms Highwinds’ Commitment to the Online Gaming Community

WINTER PARK, Fla. – Highwinds®, a leader in content delivery, network and cloud-based IP services, today announced that Valve Corporation is tapping into the Highwinds CDN (content delivery network) for Steam, the world’s largest online gaming platform. Valve, a long-time Highwinds customer, is experiencing exponential growth with Steam, and the Highwinds CDN will be instrumental in supporting the platform’s global growth and popularity.

“Highwinds has been an important part of the infrastructure behind our Steam platform for more than three years,” said Mike Dunkle, who handles source licensing and business development for Valve. “As our customer base grows internationally and we continue to post large year-over-year increases in our numbers, Highwinds remains a vital partner for us. The global reach and massive scalability of Highwinds CDN make it an ideal solution for our game delivery needs.”

Over the past several years, Steam has sustained massive increases in its key figures, including sales, total user accounts, daily active users and simultaneous players. Today, over 1,300 games are delivered over Steam to more than 30 million active users, with the number of peak simultaneous players quickly approaching five million. With its global network infrastructure, high bandwidth capacity, fast delivery speeds and industry-specific software tools, the Highwinds CDN is well-positioned to fuel Valve’s Steam platform as it continues its growth trajectory.

“We recognize Steam as the de facto standard in online video game delivery, and we are pleased to be supporting the platform as it gains traction around the world,” said Steve Miller, chairman and CEO of Highwinds. “Valve was originally brought on as a network services customer and, today, they’re utilizing our content delivery services for game delivery over Steam. Our strong relationship with Valve, which has scaled and evolved over time to support their volume and geographic growth, is representative of Highwinds’ commitment to the gaming community.”

This announcement follows closely on the heels of the launch of Highwinds GDN™ (Game Delivery Network), a vertically focused reinvention of its CDN for online game publishers. For more information about Highwinds GDN, visit www.highwinds.com/news. To schedule a meeting with Highwinds this week, Aug. 15-19, at the Game Developers Conference Europe and gamescom in Cologne, Germany, please e-mail info@highwinds.com.

About Valve Corporation
Valve is an entertainment software and technology company founded in 1996 and based in Bellevue, Wash. The company’s portfolio of entertainment properties includes Half-Life, Counter-Strike, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress, Portal and Left 4 Dead. Valve’s catalog of products accounts for over 35 million retail units sold worldwide, and over 80 percent of PC online action gameplay. In addition, Valve is a developer of leading-edge technologies, such as the Source game engine and Steam, a broadband platform for the delivery and management of digital content. For more information, please visit www.valvesoftware.com.

About Highwinds Network Group, Inc.
Highwinds is a content delivery, network and cloud-based IP services business that offers a comprehensive suite of CDN solutions, including content storage and IP software. The company delivers content and rich media over its high-performance RollingThunder® network to millions of global users every day. Highwinds CDN customers gain unprecedented command and control with its StrikeTracker® console and open APIs. Highwinds is headquartered in Winter Park, Fla., and maintains data centers around the world. For more information, visit www.highwinds.com.



Highwinds, RollingThunder and StrikeTracker are registered trademarks, and GDN is a trademark, of Highwinds Network Group, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.