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THE CHANNEL MANAGER’S
PLAYBOOK
Inc. value the market at $1.3 billion by
2020. IDC is much more aggressive,
pegging the SD-WAN market at $6
billion by 2020. It noted that nearly 70
percent of organizations expect to use
SD-WAN within the next 18 months.
Among the top drivers, accord-
ing to Webtorials’ findings, are de-
sires to increase flexibility, improve
applications performance and
reduce operational expenditures
while simplifying operations.
As use of SD-WAN solutions ramp
up, it’s certainly likely to exit some
traffic off of MPLS networks. For
starters, that’s partly because SDN
(software defined networking) allows
network operators to look to the Inter-
net, or basic broadband connections,
as their WAN (or part of it), hence
lowering the cost of network opera-
tions compared to MPLS.
Consider the issue of “back-
hauling,” for instance, otherwise
known as the “trombone effect.”
As Steven Taylor and Jim Metzler
of Webtorials explain it, a common
Mastering and
Managing SD-WAN
It’s still relatively early in the evolution of software defined
networking, but service providers are moving rather rapidly with
their respective service evolutions. Among other developments,
they are making it simpler, at least theoretically, for enterprises
to deploy SD-WAN in their networks with the introduction of fully
managed SD-WAN solutions. That includes brands familiar to the
channel, as Masergy, CenturyLink, Verizon and Telstra have all
unveiled managed WAN solutions within the past several months.
EarthLink is expected to soon follow.
Like many other managed services,
providers of managed SD-WAN typically
install and manage the edge devices for
the end user, can source and manage
disparate access links and manage the
day-to-day. Generally, the solutions can
manage connectivity from a wide range of
providers as part of an aggregated solution,
freeing up enterprise network administrators
to focus on revenue and growth initiatives.
Proponents also argue that fully managed
SD-WAN allows customers to evaluate and
adopt SD-WAN in phases.
At Masergy, the company touts the ability of its managed SD-WAN
to support three deployment models, depending on the customer’s
needs. Either dedicated premises-based hardware, cloud or distributed
virtualized software deployments are managed by the solution.
CenturyLink, meanwhile, says it bundles site connectivity,
equipment, software licensing, configuration, performance tuning and
monitoring with a comprehensive management and analytics portal.
Customers can manage their own WAN policies or have CenturyLink
manage their policies.
Organizations interested in giving CenturyLink a try can take
advantage of a free-of-charge, 90-day proof-of-concept offer
designed for businesses interested in testing SD-WAN within
their wide area networks. CenturyLink will provide the customer-
premises devices, access to a management portal and full
customer support for up to five sites to “showcase the substantial
improvements this groundbreaking network technology can bring
to businesses,” says the company.
Telstra’s offering, built on Cisco’s Intelligent WAN (IWAN) technology,
consolidates routers, firewalls and application acceleration equipment
into a single device at the branch. The solution provides application
awareness with deep-packet inspection of traffic to identify and
monitor each application’s performance and data consumption.
“This allows [administrators] to determine what traffic is running across
their networks, tune networks for business-critical services and resolve
any network problems,” say Telstra executives. “Application-specific
acceleration capabilities can be used to improve response times while
also reducing your WAN bandwidth requirements.”
At press time, EarthLink was expected to unveil its solution this fall.
Elsewhere, Utah-based master agent Telraus this fall announced
a partnership with Ecessa to distribute its SD-WAN solution.
Offering a solution that aggregates up to 25 WAN links, the Telarus/
Ecessa partnership will allow customers to leverage multiple WAN or
Internet connections from different carriers which greatly improves
network performance while reducing the overall connectivity costs,
said the companies.
This is the second master agent partnership Ecessa has
announced since August, when it entered a formal agreement with
Telecom Consulting Group.
Source: Webtorials
Source: Silver Peak Systems
Per
TeleGeography.com- Broadband vs. MPLS pricing for San Francisco Q4 2014. Median monthly price:
10-20 Mbps Broadband $110/month, 10Mbps MPLS IP VPN + Local Access $2,100 Month.
Source: Telstra
Potential Cost Savings from SD-WAN
Example Managed SD-WAN Solution
What are the primary advant ges that would drive
your company to implement an SD-WAN?
Increase flexibility
Reduce OPEX
Improve application performance
Simplify operations
Improve security
Improve availability
Deploy new functionality more quickly
0%
Between 1% and 20% Between 21% and 40%
Between 41% and 60% Between 61% and 80% More than 80%
MPLS - 10Mbps
~$2100/Month
MPLS only
~$2,520,000
Hybrid
~$1,200,000
Dual Internet
~$264,000
~$1100/Month
~$220/Month
Up to 90%
reduction
in WAN
costs
Internet 10 Mbps
MPLS - 5Mbps
Internet 10 Mbps
Internet 10 Mbps
Monthly Cost Per Site
Cost Per Year for 100 Sites
OFFICE BRANCH
APPLICATION
TRAFFIC
APPLICATION
ACCELERATION
ROUTER
FIREWALL
INTERNET
IP VPN
DATA CENTER
IP
16%
13%
12%
12%
10%
9%
8%