PLANO, Texas, Oct. 16 -- Layered Technologies Inc. (Layered Tech), a leading worldwide provider of on-demand IT infrastructure, today announced that its virtualization investments and acquisition of FastServers.net have helped drive DEFCON managed services across its broad range of products, including virtual machines. This latest advance from Layered Tech now enables customers of its Grid Layer virtual machines (VM) to experience the same highly developed services available to its dedicated server clients.

DEFCON managed services mitigate challenges commonly associated with the operations of hosted infrastructure, providing a single source for server administration, service-level based support, 24x7 monitoring and recovery, patch management, and security protection. In addition to The Grid Layer VM offering, DEFCON managed services are available with Layered Tech's on-demand, dedicated server solutions based on CentOS, Red Hat, and Windows 2003.

Tiered DEFCON managed services provide customers the freedom to choose the level of service they want to manage their servers. From DEFCON 5 (for those customers who want to manage all aspects of their server applications) to DEFCON 1 (in which Layered Tech provides the full scope of server management and monitoring), companies can customize their server operations, easily and quickly scaling up or down as their organizations grow and as needs change.

The benefits of transitioning to a hosted virtual machine environment are amplified for companies that traditionally buy multiple physical servers, because virtualization can significantly reduce costs associated with hardware, datacenters and other network infrastructure. In addition to saving hard costs, customers also can reduce demands on internal IT personnel who no longer have to manage multiple physical servers and datacenters.

"For years, Layered Tech has created flexible solutions that remove server costs and complexity so that customers can focus on their core business and leave server management to us. The extension of DEFCON managed services to our Grid Layer virtual machines is another powerful value-creating tool for our customers," said Layered Tech Chief Marketing Officer John Pozadzides. "Our roots are as a hosting provider that works closely with customers, and we're continuing to do that in the area of virtualization by giving our customers even greater choice when it comes to defining the amount of security, support, monitoring, and specialized software that is associated with their virtualization environment."

DEFCON management services are available initially to existing Layered Tech customers -- those who already are Grid Layer VM customers and those who wish to migrate from a dedicated server environment to a virtualization platform. The managed virtual machine offering includes an operating system such as CentOS and a control panel such as cPanel or Plesk; customers will have the option to buy management services for those control panels.

"We are able to offer DEFCON managed services across our suite of hosted infrastructure offerings because Layered Tech has made solid strategic decisions, including our investments in virtualization technologies and our acquisition of FastServers.net," said Jack Finlayson, CEO of Layered Tech. "Just like our traditional dedicated server hosted business has stood the test of time, we strongly believe that Layered Tech's virtualization strategy has already positioned us far ahead of other providers. In fact, virtualization solutions are the fastest-growing segment of our product and service portfolio, and we look forward to continuing to deliver cutting-edge virtualization solutions by working closely with and for our customers."

About Layered Technologies

Layered Technologies is a leading global provider of managed dedicated hosting, on-demand virtualization/grid computing and Web services. By providing high-quality technology, infrastructure and support, Layered Tech enables customers to eliminate capital expenses and save on operating costs while focusing on core business issues. Layered Tech's scalable infrastructure powers millions of sites and Internet-enabled applications including e-commerce, software as a service (SaaS), content distribution and more. Our clients range from leading-edge Web 2.0 startups, successful mid-sized enterprises and some the world's largest consultancy and integration firms. For more information about Layered Technologies, visit www.LayeredTech.com.