Fine-Tuning App DeliveriesFine-Tuning App Deliveries

How do you make the Internet into an application delivery system that's as fast and reliable as a private LAN?

Bolstered by fresh rounds of venture capital, Bang Networks and Op40 say they're up to that challenge. Both startups provide what Giga Information Group analyst Joel Yaffe calls "Internet duct tape," which lets the Web do something it was never designed to: "Run high-speed apps over a public wide area network that has no quality-of-service control and lots of bottlenecks."

Bang, which closed $14 million in second-round funding led by Atlas Ventures and Sequoia Capital last week, provides a service that lets data presented by a Web browser, such as stock quotes or headlines, to be updated instantaneously without the user having to refresh the page. The San Francisco company says it lets operators of financial-trading networks replace expensive private lines with IP-based trading platforms.

Op40 raised $15 million in financing led by Baker Capital. By year's end, the Armonk, N.Y., company plans to release software that improves the performance of Web applications by distributing data and application functionality to servers located near users, similar to what Akamai Technologies does with Web content. The software will also allow quick completion of online transactions, the vendor claims.

But will businesses move their most critical systems to the Web? Bang says the security precautions it takes and the lower costs it offers should override customer concerns.