http://tech.newstatesman.com/whitepapers/guide-multi-dimensional-adc-scaling-digital-transformation

The world of IT is undergoing a digital transformation. Applications are growing fast, and so are the users consuming them. These applications are everywhere—in the datacenter, on virtual and/or microservices platforms, in the cloud, and as SaaS. More and more apps are now being moved out of datacenters to a cloud-based infrastructure.

In order for an optimized and secure delivery of these applications, IT needs specific network appliances called Application Delivery Controllers (ADCs). These ADCs come in hardware, virtual, and containerized form factors, and are sized by Network Administrators based on the current and future usage of applications. The challenge with this is that it’s hard to foresee sizing or scalability requirements for these ADCs since users are constantly increasing, and applications are consistently evolving, as well as moving out of datacenters.