RNA networks, which virtualizes memory, has moved into cache, claiming it can remove the data center bottlenecks caused by contention for application memory, the data center's scarcest resource.

When processor speed outstrips memory capacity, bottlenecks are created that slow application performance and utilization rates. The performance and scalability of virtualized systems are particularly hard hit, according to the 451 Group.

RNA says that its RNAcache turns the RAM on a network into a shared pool that can be leveraged by hefty datasets for simultaneous access and processing.

As a result the cost of supporting business-critical memory-intensive applications is significantly lowered. Users won't have to fork out for more data center equipment. Instead they can wring revenue out of their existing boxes.

The memory sharing is done strictly with software. Applications don't have to be modified. Neither does the OS or storage. And there's no hardware to add.

RNA says the widgetry provides line-speed processing of the most memory-intensive and I/O-bound apps including predictive analytics and modeling, high-volume Internet apps and clustered environments.

One financial house beta testing the stuff reportedly got a 1,728% performance improvement running analytics on a 3TB dataset.

The company's user cases show predictive modeling improved 20x, high-volume Internet application query speed 100x, and simultaneous user capacity 5x. A high-performance cloud provider accelerated its processing rates by 30x without having to scale out its hardware, power or space footprint.

The software works in all fabric environments including gigabit Ethernet, 10 gigabit Ethernet and InfiniBand and on Linux servers. It costs $7,000-$10,000 a server node.

Cisco has taken its own approach and used chips to supplement the memory capacity of the Xeon 5500 Nehalems in its newfangled Unified Computing System.

RNA was founded in 2006, picked up a $10 million check from Menlo Ventures a year ago and came out of stealth mode in February with RNAmessenger, a latency cutter also based on its Memory Virtualization Platform, the start-up's special sauce.