The emerging intricacies associated with the Internet of Things need a robust Software-Defined WAN approach to simplify IT architectures and address bandwidth governance challenges.
The COVID-19 pandemic has swiftly accelerated the adoption of disruptive technologies. The digital transformation plans put in place by companies over a three- or four-year period have fast-forwarded rapidly over the few months of the pandemic.
Amidst the pandemic-induced social distancing guidelines, organizations had to implement work-from-home policies for their employees almost overnight. This sudden change paved the way for a massive digital transformation focus. Organizations had to raise the bar to modernize their IT architecture and strengthen network security to provide a resilient and agile work ecosystem.
Two technologies that garnered the most attention from businesses during this uncertainty are: the Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN) and the Internet of Things (IoT).
IoT devices and sensors include various applications, including intelligent lighting, connected cars, traffic analysis, medical supervision, contactless biometrics, robotics, and many more. The technology has been tested and implemented by several organizations to automate their manual processes, monitor office-space usage, inventory management, and designing an intelligent parking system.
On the other hand, SD-WAN is one of the fastest-growing enterprise networking technology that allows companies to connect remote locations to a distributed corporate network using a software-based approach. Crafted specially to increase the adaptability, security, and automation for any application, SD-WAN platforms are well ahead of technologies like MPLS and especially suited to IoT applications.
Growing connected ecosystem and SDNIndustry experts see IoT as one of the most promising technologies to accelerate digital transformation. According to Verified Market Research, a leading Global Research and Consulting firm, the Global Internet of Things Market (IoT Market) Size was valued at $212.1 billion in 2018 and is likely to witness a growth of 25.68% from 2019-2026 and reach $1,319.08 billion by 2026.
Linked through the cloud, the IoT devices exchange a massive quantity of data regularly, which gets interpreted through intelligent analytic dashboards by organizations to make their operations and services more efficient.
For businesses, deploying IoT will go a long way in streamlining workflows and enhancing data optimization. However, in the distributed workforce environment, where the number of endpoints will grow incessantly, managing networks and bandwidth can become complicated. This can impact the organization’s cognitive operations and upset various cloud applications available to employees and devices in offices.
With the cloud becoming a dominant force for delivering applications, SD-WAN is becoming one of the most exciting technologies to provide the necessary bandwidth and flexible hybrid WAN.
In the context of the multi-cloud environment and the growing ecosystem of connected devices, the future of work will require that IT react in real-time through automated processes, regardless of employees’ workplace. This can only be accomplished when distributed devices are seamlessly connected with no latency issues and fully supported by the secure network. And to fully implement this smart, self-contained work environment, SD-WAN can play a critical role in enabling organizations to connect, collaborate, and manage their networks effectively in a modernized way.
Because of its software-based approach, SD-WAN enables enterprises to monitor various connectivity patterns and endpoints from a unified platform. This technology helps organizations and network administrators to strictly monitor bandwidth, security, power, compliance, and other requirements required by IoT devices at remote sites.
Using SD-WAN, companies can partition network architectures, helping them to optimize their bandwidth usage. This ensures the amount of data required for various IoT applications, improves network resiliency, and drives cost efficiencies. Intelligent integrated analysis and remote monitoring capabilities ensure that bandwidth is used to its full potential, that network failure is minimal, and security threats are addressed quickly.
The technology also provides businesses the flexibility to rapidly upgrade the connectivity needs without any infrastructure-related amendments.
Game changer for 5GAs 5G will inevitably become available across the globe, connecting billions of devices, IoT will transform almost every process and the way we connect – to our homes, offices, doctors, or government. Through data science and analytics, IoT solutions aim to make a place of work safer, enhance customer experience, increase the distributed workforce’s productivity, and strengthen businesses’ resiliency.
5G will completely change the networking and introduce several new applications and stress on virtual networks. SD-WAN solutions are capable of listing traffic and load-balancing requirements to further fast-track array of application performance, which is much needed in IoT. Even though users connect to different services, SD-WAN solutions can prove a useful bridge to establish flexibility manage bandwidth, ensuring an exceptional user experience every time.
To adapt to this new environment and leverage the full potential of IoT enabled connected devices, organizations need to weigh their options and consult with a specialist partner, such as NEXAPP, to deploy a custom SD-WAN architecture.
NEXAPP technologies use a software-defined approach for managed integrated converged SD-WAN for business to business (B2B) legacy and virtual environment, machine to machine (M2M), and IoT. With 400+ customers and 10000+ active deployment, the company empowers organizations to connect, secure, and run the network with expert, proactive managed-hands-on support as needed.
With 5G likely to dominate 2021, the time is right to evaluate to assess the capabilities to enhance the digital ecosystem that accelerates enterprise innovations and IoT transformations.
Learn more about deploying modern SD-WAN and 5G infrastructure on the NEXAPP by clicking here Nexapp Technologies
