SD-WAN

 

SD-WAN offers enterprises high degree of flexibility for WAN load balancing, optimization and visibility. SD-WAN consolidates multiple networking functions into a single software-defined vCPE platform which virtualizes all the network functions with enhanced service agility, security and QoS (Quality of Service).

 

 

Retail chains all over the world have been investigating network transformation in order to improve customer experience and reduce overhead. Retail services today have evolved to be more and more diversified, including virtual fitting room in fast fashion trends, online demo video of suites in hotels and real estates, as well as real-time inventory checks for clerks and customers. All these newly innovated services need a better bandwidth, more cost-effective WAN architecture to meet customer satisfaction.

Retail chains today have shown growing reliance on advanced IT technologies to manage their inventories, transaction records and customer database. In particular, the global-scale retail chains may generate high-volume of transactions and customer data on a daily basis, and they have to manage inventory records in their warehouses worldwide. However, retail chains face the challenges in their network architecture. Traditionally, retailers rely on vendor-specific, disparate networking equipment and software, and therefore, OPEX have obviously increased when they expand in locations.

Cloud computing is no longer a new buzzword, and in fact, cloud computing is approaching to its next evolution: cloud-first strategy. By definition, it specifies all the business networking activities are conducted in the cloud first. Cloud-first strategy makes practical senses for global enterprises with branches worldwide so that employees can synchronize from mobile devices and remote locations. In fact, organizations with initiatives for cloud-first strategy are requiring a virtualized, automated, and agile network orchestration to easily manage their IT infrastructure, in order to manage the increasing traffics on the cloud and their applications. Thus, SD-WAN has become the optimal choice as it also comes with the capability in securing business applications.

More and more Cloud-centric enterprises are realizing that SD-WAN and DPI together prove to be a powerful combination for not only delivering application-based network performance and for improving efficiency, but also for cutting costs and for increasing business sustainability.

SD-WAN has been one of the hottest and fastest-growing technologies in the networking industry for the past years, and the main reasons include ease of deployments, simplified maintenance and management, and the cost reduction. For communication service providers (CSPs), SD-WAN presents a revenue opportunity as they have been encountered with increasing demands for SaaS (software as a service) applications and cloud-based services, which have become a burden for their bandwidth and traffic routing. SD-WAN provides the agility and flexibility to enable CSP with the enhanced bandwidth to meet the pace of today’s networking demands.

As the business world has moved towards further digitalization, the competitiveness of enterprises heavily relies on application serviceability and network performance. In fact, it is the application awareness or even intelligence that drives SD-WAN to be more flexible than conventional WAN architecture in terms of visibility and control to set priority over the network. With application awareness, SD-WAN effectively reduces bandwidth burden and OPEX/CAPEX for IT management.

There is no doubt that SD-WAN has been one of the most preferred networking technology for enterprises and service providers, and in fact, the growth has expanded not only for office settings, but also in outdoor environments. In recent years, various sectors including entertainment, public events, medical and logistics, have installed A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) and IoT (Internet of Things) hardware and software to enhance user experience, and these require better outdoor connectivity.

Страница 4 из 5