SEATTLE -- F5 Networks, Inc. (FFIV) today announced that it has agreed to acquire LineRate Systems, a developer of software defined networking (SDN) services. Through this acquisition, F5 gains access to LineRate’s layer 7+ networking services technology, intellectual property, and engineering talent, further building on F5’s commitment to bring superior service agility, application intelligence, and programmability to software defined data centers.“F5’s vision is to enable application-layer SDN services for software defined data centers, providing our customers with unprecedented automation, orchestration, and control,” said Karl Triebes, EVP of Product Development and CTO at F5. “Extreme scale of applications, infrastructure, and services will be vital to SDN, core to F5, and the key to customers realizing the benefits of software defined data centers. LineRate’s programmable network capabilities and innovations in layer 7 will bolster our efforts to extend F5’s market leadership in these areas, and we are very pleased to welcome the LineRate team to F5.”F5 Networks Inc.