What problems Does SD-WAN Solve? How it can provide high-speed data transfer services?
What Problems Does SD-WAN Solve?
SD-WAN is a relatively new term, coined in 2012 by IDC. Technology has been around for many years. One of the first attempts at this comes from an Australian company, Verigy in 2009. They developed and released their SD-WAN solution called ‘NowPath’.
The term SD-WAN was coined when Cisco Systems announced its intent to buy Viptela for $610 million in 2015. Cisco also released its SD-WAN solution. It is called ‘Cisco ASR 9000 Series Software Defined WAN which is an integrated software and hardware solution.
Moreover, the SD-WAN market is steadily growing at an annual rate of 23.7%, reaching $2.5 billion by 2021. So, SD-WAN can be used in a wide range of applications, through various deployment models.
SD-WAN Technology Solution
The SD-WAN technology has seen increasing popularity. Because it is relatively inexpensive and easy to set up, compared to other WAN technologies. So, the SD-WAN was also designed to handle applications that were traditionally difficult to manage.
However, the technology is susceptible to latency issues and performance problems. Because it is dependent on multiple internet connections. Many customers are also under the impression that a traditional WAN is more secure.
This is more than one secured by an SD-WAN solution, but this claim is misleading. Also, the data transmitted over an SD-WAN solution is not necessarily more secure. But it is easier to implement security policies through the use of a centralized management system.
SD-WAN products are typically categorized as either controller-based or software-only solutions. So, they are also commonly categorized by deployment models: on-premises, cloud-based, and hybrid solutions. Also, controller-based solutions are the most common type of SD-WAN solutions.
Greater Flexibility in Configuring Policies
This type of solution is installed in the customer’s network and managed by a third party or the customer’s IT department. So, these solutions use a centralized controller that manages all networking components in the network. Because each component can be controlled from one location.
So, controller-based solutions provide benefits. These are such as offloading services from the router and firewall to increase performance and security features. This is such as web filtering and anti-malware protection for all connected devices.
However, these solutions are more complex to manage. Because multiple components must be set up correctly before they can be used effectively. These products are also more expensive than software-only solutions because they require additional hardware and software components.
Software-only solutions use a combination of router firmware and software along with a cloud service. This is provided by the vendor to create an integrated solution for managing networking components. Also, they are easy to manage because they typically require little or no configuration before they can be used effectively.
But it may be difficult to manage them once they have been deployed because they lack centralized management capabilities. Software-only solutions provide many benefits. However, they do not offer several security features that controller-based solutions offer, such as anti-malware protection or web filtering tools.