News

Firms Tap Cisco, Juniper, VMware for SD-WAN Functionality

• By David Ramel
• 10/01/2019

In the growing software-defined wide-area network (SD-WAN) space, vendors are tapping products from leading powerhouses such as Cisco, Juniper and VMware to augment their offerings.

Here's a look at recent developments that illustrate this trend.

Juniper/PYXYA
Juniper Networks teamed up with PYXYA, a French managed service provider, for a solution based on Juniper's Contrail SD-WAN offering.

A Juniper statement described PYXYA as a disruptor of traditional managed service models with its over-the-top (OTT) secure SD-WAN service that leverages Contrail SD-WAN on existing network infrastructures.

The French company's services will include Contrail SD-WAN functionality such as service orchestration and the NFX150 Networks Services Platform.

"As part of the partnership, PYXYA aims to leverage the broader capabilities of Contrail SD-WAN to move from SD-WAN to SD-Branch services in the future," the statement said. "PYXYA's portal now allows control of the WAN infrastructure, as well as the universalization software of the universal PyBox. Its solution is evolving to integrate the management of local network infrastructures and Wi-Fi. The company intends to then migrate its solution to manage all the IT infrastructure of the site through the SD-Branch."

Altice USA/Cisco
The New York-based Altice USA, a media/communications company, is working with Cisco to expand its enterprise SD-WAN service offerings.

"Using Cisco's Managed Services Accelerator (MSX) platform, Altice USA can offer its enterprise customers a host of differentiated services in a seamless, reliable, and secure manner," a statement said. "With this innovative leap forward, Altice business customers can have their managed services turned up quickly, managed securely from the cloud and modified easily using software-defined networking technology. Additionally, this solution will enable Altice to provide a new set of infrastructure and platform services in the future."

Plixer/VMware/Cisco
While not a partnership per se, Plixer announced multi-vendor SD-WAN visibility in its Scrutinizer network and security intelligence platform.

Those multi-vendor choices include VMware SD-WAN by VeloCloud, and Viptela, which is now part of Cisco.

The Kennebunk, Maine, company touts end-to-end visibility in its platform, with other benefits said to include: the ability to monitor traffic paths across an SD-WAN; proactive notification of topology changes; SLA monitoring and assurance and more.

"With VMware SD-WAN by VeloCloud, we are disrupting the traditional WAN with software defined network control that delivers transport independent agility, performance and visibility to any hybrid cloud destination", said VMware exec Steve Woo. "We are very pleased to have Plixer as an ecosystem contributor to provide mutual customers with application and traffic visibility extending from the mobile edge, through the SD-WAN, all the way into the cloud. This combined solution allows VMware customers to optimize user experience for applications being accessed from datacenter, cloud and multi-cloud."