Have you heard of this thing called the “Cloud”? If not then you have likely been hiding from technology for quite some time now.
The Cloud is where companies go to access their critical business applications. Over the last several years companies have been moving to a number of different Cloud strategies.
With critical business applications in the Cloud, how does an enterprise consumer get to the cloud? Today, it is done over the Internet or via a private connection to the application provider. Most offices today have multiple data circuits coming into their office. Why? Because if they cannot get to their applications their businesses go offline. Traditionally, businesses have hired Senior Network Engineers to configure the onsite devices that one or two data circuits terminate into. The goal is to always have access to these critical applications. The devices traditionally used can be expensive, require skill sets that are not available in a given organization, have failovers that take too long and frankly do not have friendly analytics on the health of a consumer’s data circuits.
Fast forward to today. Most enterprise companies are looking into SD WAN solutions to remedy some of these current obstacles. Depending on the SD WAN option the consumer is looking into, a single or redundant device can essentially replace a traditional router, firewall, optimizer or wireless access device into a single turn-key device. The device software has a GUI interface that is user friendly and takes much of the traditional high level network engineering out of the equation. Depending on the device being used, the consumer can expect that they can plug multiple data circuits into the device and with very little effort setup and manage the device out of a single viewing panel. One of the major benefits is the ability to make changes and updates with a single click of a button to all the devices on the network. For a retail organization that has several hundreds of devices this is a dream come true. Additionally, SD WAN devices are constantly policing and monitoring the health of the data circuits to make sure the consumer traffic is taking the most optimal routes to their applications. Perimeters can be setup to notify an IT organization of potential issues on the circuit(s) in the network. This allows a much better user experience.
A great example is the WAZE app on my mobile phone. I can put in the same origination and destination points several times in a given week and it will provide various routes based on the dynamic travel information available at that moment. The same is true with SD WAN circuits.
As a global service provider that provides enterprise business consumers with data circuits this is a real game changer. Businesses will have analytics and tools available to them that have never been so easily accessible. As we continue to move to a world of voice over the internet and video over the internet these devices will enhance the user experience immensely and provide automatic failover nearly without incident.
Imagine a sales person on the phone with a very important client. The office internet drops offline but is automatically rerouted to the “other” data circuit. The call is never dropped. It is as if the incident did not take place. The same goes for mission critical applications that sit in the cloud.
We live in exciting times as it relates to technology and if you haven’t heard about the role SD WAN will play, you most certainly will. In the near future, organizations will enjoy a faster experience to these mission critical applications with less opportunity of experiencing the inability to reach them.
About Author: Rick Crabbe is the President at Threshold Communications. He holds a degree course from Washington State University and contributed his massive skills to Airbone Express and McLeod USA. Currently he is working at Threshold Communications is a global full service telecommunications provider.
