According to the new report “SD-WAN Potential in Communications in the Cognitive Era” by IDC Research Spain together with Evolutio and Cisco, 64% of Spanish companies are already using SD-WAN networks, and, in fact, 36% are already making extensive use of them.
The new report from IDC Research Spain confirms that SD-WAN technology, based on hybrid network architectures, has seen its popularity grow in recent years, partly because it adds centralized software-based intelligence that monitors, analyzes, and controls the network, allowing the user to combine different connectivity systems (e.g., MPLS, Internet, Ethernet, and wireless) into a hybrid network, which can result in an optimal combination of cost and performance for each location and application.
In fact, the IDC, Evolutio and Cisco report reveals that the use cases where the application of SD-WAN networks seems most beneficial are related to the management of a large network of subsidiaries, the need for increased security, the increase in network traffic, or the ease of managing multiple providers.
Drivers and inhibitors
According to the report “SD-WAN Potential in Communications in the Cognitive Era,” the main reason driving Spanish organizations to adopt SD-WAN solutions is improved network security, cited by 34% of the companies surveyed. The second most common driver is faster provisioning (33%), followed by enhanced resilience (31%).
Regarding the factors inhibiting SD-WAN adoption, organizations themselves highlight the implementation cost, as well as security concerns. This latter point can be interpreted as a preference for not making changes to traditional WANs due to their lack of automated, agile, and secure mechanisms, which could potentially impact service.
SD-WAN in the cloud context
New digital needs are driving organizations to evolve their platforms toward the cloud model, aiming to provide their communications and digital services with the flexibility, scalability, and response times required to meet increasingly demanding market needs. As reflected in the report by IDC Research Spain, Evolutio, and Cisco, 63% of Spanish companies are opting for the cloud model as the most efficient protocol for data consolidation and information transmission in this digital age.
In the traditional scenario, static, low-latency, high-bandwidth links, typically provided by MPLS infrastructure, are increasingly considered inadequate for connecting branch offices and remote locations that route much of their traffic to cloud service provider data centers. User locations are also changing, with a growing proportion of traffic to enterprise applications arriving from mobile endpoints, which are used alternately on-premises and from other locations.
The importance of managed services
Another key finding of the latest IDC Research Spain report is that organizations' attitudes toward managing their WANs have traditionally been mixed. Some have opted to maintain control, while a substantial number prefer to let their communications service provider or a service provider manage them. SD-WAN has the potential to strike this balance. New technology, centralized control, user-friendly management tools, and the growing opportunity to use direct internet access as a transport medium are reinforcing interest in managed models. At the same time, increasing network requirements and architectural complexity favor managed service models, as does the growing trend toward IT-as-a-Service.
The current competitive landscape for managed SD-WAN services offers a diverse range of options, including technology vendors, managed service providers, and established CSPs. These service providers are also rapidly developing their own offerings, often in close collaboration with specific technology vendors, to defend and strengthen their position in the overall managed WAN market. To date, many early technology solutions have focused on providing end users with a completely new network solution to replace traditional WANs. However, in many cases, SD-WAN will become a complement to traditional network solutions, such as MPLS-based IP VPNs, to provide overlay on hybrid network architectures, which can include MPLS, the Internet, Ethernet, and mobile access.
IDC Research Spain believes that managed service providers will increasingly need to develop solutions that allow organizations to gradually adopt SD-WAN capabilities. Many choose to test, evaluate, and deploy on a limited scale before making more extensive deployments across their networks. To address this alternative, managed service providers will increasingly need to provide an interoperable path between traditional sites and SD-WAN. CSPs, in particular, should focus, according to the analyst firm, on tighter integration with other key components of their network development roadmap, specifically those related to cloud connectivity and network functions virtualization (NFV).
In the words of Jacinto Cavestany, CEO of Evolutio, “the digitalization of the economy has ceased to be a marketing slogan and has become a basic business necessity for companies that want to remain competitive. And part of this effort depends on strengthening their infrastructure and networks to harness their full digital potential.”.
“SD-WAN is becoming the de facto standard for WANs,” says Carlos Infante, Director of Enterprise Networks at Cisco Spain. “It allows for the easy connection of offices to a wide range of cloud-based applications, reducing complexity and operating costs while improving the security and performance of mission-critical applications in the multi-cloud era.”.
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