by Damian Murray | Oct 8, 2020 | Uncategorized
In this series to date we have talked about the drivers for SD-WAN, the main features and related benefits and also looked at how to overcome some of the more common obstacles with adoption and deployment. This week we will delve a little deeper into one of the main choices to be made when looking at SD-WAN deployment – whether to build and run the network in house (Self Managed) or if it is better to have a third party provide this on behalf of your company (Managed SD-WAN). But first a quick Recap: Digital transformation and the repositioning of business-critical applications to the cloud brings with it many network challenges for enterprises. As a result, the nature of the network is growing more complex for all enterprises. Among the biggest networking complaints is Quality of Service/Quality of Experience (QoS/QoE) with poorly performing applications such as UC disrupting business and giving rise to application performance and prioritisation requirements. SD-WAN has emerged as the go-to solution for re-architecting the enterprise network to overcome these challenges and facilitate digital transformation objectives such as cloud migration. Key reasons for adopting SD-WAN include: Visibility of which applications, users or devices are consuming bandwidth Control over how application traffic flows are routed Applying policies to suit specific requirements and demands of the respective applications Resilience on an active-active basis across multiple links on a per application priority basis Secure sophisticated encryption to ensure the integrity of data on the network SD-WAN Deployment Choices There are many SD-WAN solutions and many go-to-market models. This had led many organisations to focus too heavily on trying to...
by Damian Murray | Oct 1, 2020 | Uncategorized
Due to developments such as ever-increasing numbers of business applications competing for network resources, growing network traffic demands and enhanced network flexibility requirements, the networking needs of organisations both public and private are becoming more and more complex. In particular, the problems organisations are facing with digital transformation and migration of critical applications to the cloud cannot be solved with legacy enterprise WAN solutions. SD-WAN has evolved to address those challenges. Most organisations are by now aware of the benefits that SD WAN delivers but as it is a new and rapidly evolving technology and often outside many organisations’ expertise, the practicalities often put deploying a solution on hold. The SD-WAN concept is simple in principle, i.e. deliver the optimum connectivity experience to sites, users and devices in accessing network resources and services unconstrained by access mode or location. However, successful SD-WAN project implementation throws up many challenges and gives rise to several considerations in deciding which products and service delivery models are best suited to an individual organisation’s business needs. SD-WAN Adoption While not universally applicable, SD-WAN can meet the changing requirement of most enterprise organisations as demands on the network grow. Key to a decision to adopt SD-WAN is a review of the business considerations that are driving the change and the focus should be on what problems and business outcomes is the SD-WAN platform expected to address. Considerations include: What is the organisation structure and footprint – are there several branch offices, sites and remote users accessing network resources? Is the business on or about to embark on a digital transformation? Are business critical applications and...
by Damian Murray | Sep 23, 2020 | Uncategorized
In the first post in this series we looked at the various drivers for SD-WAN adoption and the factors that are influencing decisions that companies are taking as they move to take advantage of this new technology. But how exactly does SD-WAN address some of the requirements that we highlighted previously, what are the key features and ultimately what are the main benefits that an organisation adopting SD-WAN should expect to see? To begin with, we should acknowledge that there are many different SD-WAN solutions available in the market and while sometimes differing in terms of focus and terminology used, they are all aiming to address essentially the same demands from companies at the various stages of digital transformation. While differences exist, there are a core set of capabilities and related benefits that leading SD-WAN solutions comprise as follows: Centralised Control At the core of an SD-WAN is a centralised control or Orchestration platform which provides the configuration and management of the SD-WAN. Centralised control is key in terms of realising the SDN principle of separation of the control and data planes, effectively abstracting the underlying connectivity regardless of type (fixed or wireless), removing any related dependencies that would otherwise exist and providing the freedom and flexibility to architect a set of virtual overlay connections in the manner best suited to business needs. It is these overlay connections or tunnels that then allow the SD-WAN to provide the required flexibility and visibility needed in modern networks. Packet Recognition and Steering The ability to recognise traffic on a per packet basis and to then steer this traffic across the preferred...
by Damian Murray | Sep 16, 2020 | Uncategorized
This is the first of our new series of posts focussed on addressing the main questions we receive from customers about SD-WAN. Over the coming weeks we will address the most important reasons for choosing SD-WAN and the main considerations for deployment based on our own and customer experiences. To begin with, we look at what is motivating companies to choose SD-WAN. One of the main drivers for SD-WAN adoption today is the move to take advantage of cloud based services, both Software and Infrastructure as a service. Many companies both large and small have or are about to embark on a digital transformation journey and for most that means a very significant shift to cloud hosted applications and workload. What that also means however is that the traditional wide area network, commonly architected on a hub and spoke basis, is no longer capable of dealing with the demands being placed on it. Failure to address this issue can result in poor application performance and ultimately, a poor user experience. The traditional network was designed to carry traffic from remote or branch locations back to a central site, a data centre or HQ, where applications were hosted or from where traffic could be safely forwarded. Modern environments place both applications and workload in many different locations meaning that the traditional network is no longer optimised to deal with the demand. Compounding this, the volume of applications in use is growing continuously and the requirement to optimise the network on a per application basis is therefore critical to meet the need of the modern enterprise. These fundamental changes mean that...
by Damian Murray | May 26, 2020 | Uncategorized
With the move to working from home and the growing expectation that in many cases this is likely to remain a reality for many employees for the foreseeable future, more and more companies are looking at ways to improve connectivity issues and in turn ensure security for remote workers. In recent weeks many of our customers have started expanding existing SD-WAN deployments or adding SD-WAN as a secure and reliable way to improve the experience for both customers and employees when communicating from a home office environment. Traditionally remote office environments don’t have any quality of service and cannot offer priority to those applications that need it. Congestion mitigation is typically not available and in many cases the performance of consumer broadband can be very variable. SD-WAN can solve these issues, even when only a single link is available and can provide reliable cloud connections and the ability to apply policies and in turn assure application performance. Critical services such as the use of SaaS and IaaS based applications, video conferencing and the increased use of VoIP, in particular for customer facing staff, require more than standard VPN, they require SD-WAN. At Iricent, we are working with partners and with customers to help with this transition to remote working and are happy to offer free trials combined with professional services support to allow customers to learn for themselves the benefits of SD-WAN for remote working. If this sounds interesting, contact us at remote-working@iricent.com to schedule a call or a...
by Damian Murray | Oct 25, 2019 | Uncategorized
We are delighted to announce that Iricent has been selected as a partner by Intel in the Network Builders Winners Circle Program. The award was achieved for bringing to market the Iricent NFV Cloud platform utilizing Intel centric uCPE HW with NFVI SW, MANO and VNFs from leading vendor partners. Initial use case is uCPE and Edge Cloud deployment for SP and Enterprise Customers – typically focussed on SD WAN, while the rapidly emerging use case is Neutral Host for Mobile – specifically 5G deployment on vRAN. “As a member of the Intel Network Builders ecosystem, Iricent has contributed to the acceleration of network transformation by working closely with Intel and our ecosystem and we would like to recognize your contributions by awarding Iricent in our Winners’ Circle Program as a Partner.” We are looking forward to even closer collaboration with Intel as we close out 2019 and head into 2020. ...
