by Streamlining Network Management with SD-WAN Managed Services
What Is Wan?
Wide networks are telecommunication networks that can connect devices from several locations worldwide. WANs are the largest and most comprehensive computer network to date.
What is the purpose of a WAN connection?
In the absence of WAN connections, organizations would be isolated in limited areas or specific geographic areas. Local area networks allow organizations to work within their building. Still, external growth – whether to different cities or even other countries – would not be possible because the associated infrastructure would be prohibitive for most organizations.
As organizations grow and become international, WAN networks allow them to communicate, share information and keep in touch between branch offices. When employees travel to work, WANs give them access to the information they need to do their jobs. WANs help organizations share information with customers and partner organizations, such as B2B customers or clients. However, WANs also provide an essential service to the public. Students can rely on WANs to access library databases or university research. And everyday people rely on WANs for communication, banking, shopping, and more.
SD-WAN as a Service vs. managed SD-WAN
SD-WAN managed service refers to a service typically paid by a user to a service provider to install and provide connections and services such as software monitoring and maintenance services. For service providers, the service provider can use a managed SD-WAN to offer value-added services, including SD-WAN security enhancements. These services often include service level agreements (SLAs) that guarantee a minimum service level.
What is the purpose of SD-WAN?
SD-WAN managed service refers to SD-WAN connectivity as a managed service provided to users through software instrumentation. The SD-WAN architecture is attractive because it can replace a typical WAN router and supports transport technologies, including MPLS, Internet, and cellular networks. SD-WAN also enables load sharing between WANs, which facilitates data transfer. As IT networks grow in complexity, ensuring their reliability and peak performance has never been more challenging. IT teams must constantly monitor multiple elements and respond to equipment failures as soon as they occur. Even short-term disruptions can be very costly and frustrating for employees and customers.
Many different factors can cause disturbances. These range from misconfiguration of key components and lack of bandwidth to external forces such as cybercriminals seeking to infiltrate IT infrastructure.
How To Streamline The Network Management with SD-WAN Managed Services
The transition to hybrid work has made it challenging to identify and resolve problems quickly. Instead of being protected by the perimeter defenses traditionally the case, workers are now much more likely to work – at least sometimes – from home.
Hybrid work also means that users are increasingly using cloud-based resources. IT teams must ensure that users see the same network performance whether they access resources through the cloud or in the office.
Another factor is the diverse range of devices that employees use to connect to networks and perform daily tasks. While most have traditionally used desktop computers, they are now more likely to relate to laptops, tablets, and smartphones. In that case, stop asking what is WAN as SD-WAN managed service is a solution to streamline your network. Let’s see how.
Achieving Reliability and Efficiency
In this evolving environment, the SD-WAN managed service has become an essential part of the enterprise infrastructure. It allows distributed locations such as remote workers, branch offices, and business partners to connect and use the resources they need to do their work.
Traditional WAN architectures used a hub-and-spoke design to manage network traffic, with all traffic flowing through the enterprise data center and then back to users. This model is no longer effective. Since the number of remote functions is significantly higher, passing all traffic through a central point degrades performance and causes frustration for users.
A better approach is to use cloud-based software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) technology. This allows the network to function where users are directly connected to cloud services or other users. While traditional WANs use expensive MPLS circuits to connect remote locations to data centers, SD-WANs can also use alternative connectivity options such as broadband, cellular, and even satellite to efficiently route traffic based on route optimization and application prioritization. As a result, operational efficiency and cloud application performance are improved, while traffic handled by the core data center is reduced.
Advanced Security and Management
In addition to improving the performance of SD-WAN networks, they also have built-in security mechanisms. They are designed to protect network traffic, devices, and users from cybercriminals. Mechanisms provide both internal and external traffic, applying multiple levels of protection. These include intrusion detection systems, built-in firewalls, malware protection, and other advanced measures. Most can also be integrated with other third-party security solutions if needed. An additional advantage of the SD-WAN managed service is the ability to use a unified management platform. Instead of relying on multiple management tools, SD-WAN managed service can provide network management teams with a single view of the entire network. This includes visibility into SD-WAN, wired, and wireless networks. Such unified management capabilities enable network management groups to implement centralized policy creation and enforcement.
Most importantly, network performance, security monitoring, and management are simplified. Organizations that leverage the capabilities of SD-WAN managed services are in a much better position to deliver the efficiency and security that users demand. This is especially important in an age where remote and hybrid work remains the norm.
SD-WAN delivers application consistency and flexibility, automates traffic management in an application-specific manner based on business objectives, improves network security, and simplifies WAN architecture. SD-WAN managed services use a centralized management function to securely and intelligently route traffic directly across the WAN to trusted SaaS and IaaS providers. It enhances application and provides a high-quality user experience that increases business productivity and agility and reduces IT costs. Therefore, SD-WAN services are replaced by the old and traditional WAN services.
