F5 Networks, Inc., the global leader in Application Delivery Networking, today announced that it has been recognized by VMware as a winner of a Global VMware Partner Network Award in the Technology Innovator Partner of the Year category. The award was presented at VMware Partner Exchange 2011, VMware’s annual partner event, this week in Orlando.

“VMware’s partners continue to be the foundation of our business, and we are pleased to recognize the great work they have accomplished throughout 2010,” said Doug Smith, VP, Global Partner Strategy and Operations, VMware. “VMware Partner Exchange brings partners together for training, education, and networking with peers to help deliver enterprise hybrid cloud solutions to customers—making this the premier event to help them strengthen their virtualization and cloud practices and distinguish themselves in the marketplace. We congratulate F5, and we look forward to continuing our work together.”

“Since joining VMware’s Technology Alliance Partner program in 2008, F5 has driven a number of integration and interoperability efforts aimed at enhancing the value of customers’ virtualization and cloud deployments,” said Jim Ritchings, VP of Business Development at F5. “We’re extremely proud of the industry-leading work accomplished with VMware in 2010, and we look forward to continued collaboration to deliver new innovations around server and desktop virtualization, cloud solutions, and more.”

“According to ESG’s 2011 IT Spending Intentions survey, businesses continue to lay down on the accelerator pedal with their server virtualization investments,” said Mark Bowker, Senior Analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group. “The VMware and F5 partnership’s strength is in its ability to deliver solutions across a broad portfolio as the companies help customers solve challenges, migrate new workloads, and deploy with confidence.”

To learn more about F5’s partnership efforts with VMware, please visit www.f5.com/solutions/applications/vmware/.