Cisco is exiting the data centre load balancing market, confirming that it is ceasing development on its Application Control Engine product line.

While only a back-alley in the Borg’s sprawling product line, the confirmation that ACE will be added to the Cisco end-of-life list will be a fillip for companies like F5, Radware, Riverbed Networks, Brocade, Citrix and others.

ACE modules are sold for data centre boxes such as the 7600 router and Catalyst 6500 switch.

As far back as 2009, Gartner was calling ACE a “legacy platform”, predicting that Cisco would have to cede the application acceleration market to specialists. According to this NASDAQ note, Topeka Capital Markets says the product’s market share was already in decline.

While the ACE series hasn’t yet been given an end-of-life date, customers will need to look at migration options ahead of the product’s retirement.

ACE will have good company on the EOL list, where it will share billing with a small host of other content engine products.

The confirmation that the product was being axed came via CRN, which was told by Cisco: “Cisco routinely reviews its business to determine where it needs to align investment based on growth opportunities. In assessing the data center market, which is undergoing a fundamental transformation within virtualization, cloud, and new service delivery models, Cisco has decided it will not develop further generations of its ACE load-balancing products.”

On September 14, Tech Trader reported that Cisco was scaling back sales of the ACE platform. That information came from a research note from JMP Securities. ®