Jacobsz further refers to a recent blog written by Silver Peak founder and CEO, David Hughes, who also notes that the value of SD-WAN lies in more than just cost savings.\u00a0 Hughes notes the following predictions for the SD-WAN arena in 2018.<\/p>\n Enterprises will adopt cloud-first WAN architectures<\/strong> Hughes believes that in 2018, most enterprises will start to adopt a \u2018cloud-first\u2019 SD-WAN architecture designed to efficiently and effectively support the ongoing evolution in their application mix.<\/p>\n The new WAN edge will replace the traditional branch router<\/strong> The new WAN edge will enable improved security architectures<\/strong> \u201cIn 2018, the new WAN edge empowers enterprises to make this decision on an application-by-application basis. Network managers can elect to breakout trusted traffic locally at the branch, divert to a cloud-based firewall service or backhaul to a full security stack at a central location. Enterprise-grade SD-WAN solutions also enable enterprises to micro-segment traffic across the WAN, thereby containing the impact of any breach.\u201d<\/p>\n Cloud-based management becomes the default<\/strong> \u201cCloud-based management and orchestration simplify initial deployment, provide better ongoing availability and most importantly are backed with web-scale storage and compute resources that enable analytics and machine learning-based techniques that would be difficult to support in most private enterprise environments,\u201d said Hughes.<\/p>\n One Virtual Network Function (VNF) is better than four<\/strong><\/p>\n Ultimately, one advanced SD-WAN-based VNF will provide all the networking services required in a typical branch site deployment. The value of universal CPE will centre on the ability for enterprises to select their preferred technology stack without switching out hardware.<\/p>\n The first SD-WAN-driven listing on the stock market<\/strong> \u201c<\/strong>We can see from the above statements that SD-WAN is gaining traction in the market,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Jacobsz added that the idea of 2018 showcasing the fist listing on a public stock exchange of an SD-WAN would be a symbolic development that would show how far this arena has evolved.<\/p>\n \u201cEnterprises are well advised to carefully consider SD-WAN as an optimal solution for their organisation\u2019s ongoing networking development,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n SD-WAN technology differentiators include dynamic path control, zero-touch provisioning, cloud intelligence and path conditioning, which ensures private-line performance over the Internet.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Software defined wide area networks (SD-WANs) have been generally known for a value proposition that revolves around cost savings on bandwidth. When businesses look to cut the high costs of running a wide area network, SD-WANs can help to save on money by replacing high cost MPLS networks with lower cost broadband internet connections. However, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":17701,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[136,6,36,54,183,13],"tags":[4852,250,4853,376,252,4851,1448],"class_list":["post-17700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry-expert","category-insights","category-intelligent-technology","category-research","category-software","category-top-stories","tag-andrew-lerner","tag-anton-jacobsz","tag-david-hughes","tag-gartner","tag-networks-unlimited","tag-sd-wans","tag-silver-peak"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17700"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17700\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17710,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17700\/revisions\/17710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2018\/03\/Anton-Jacobsz-1000-300x200.jpg\")
\nToday, most WAN traffic, to and from branch and remote sites, is destined for the cloud. However, the traditional WAN was architected for branch-to-data-centre traffic flows, not to efficiently support new cloud-driven traffic patterns.<\/p>\n
\nWith SD-WAN as a foundation, a new class of centrally-orchestrated, application-driven WAN edge devices will replace traditional routers in the branch.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cFor years, enterprises have been hamstrung, forced to choose between backhauling all branch office traffic to one of several next gen firewall-equipped hubs or deploying a firewall at every branch site,\u201d said Hughes.<\/p>\n
\nHughes notes that the number of devices under cloud management is growing steadily, expanding beyond Wi-Fi to switching and now to the new WAN edge.<\/p>\n
\nHughes believes that as SD-WAN hits mainstream, the largest independent SD-WAN vendors will likely to be able to pursue an initial public offering (IPO) and list on the stock market.<\/p>\n