Blueprint: Why SD-WAN Cannot Solve for the MPLS Conundrum

Software-defined infrastructure has firmly gained traction in public and private data centers and clouds, because of its game-changing nature: It has virtualized the server, giving it scalable capacity on demand at a fraction of the cost of its hardware counterpart. And what software-defined did for the server and storage markets, it is bound to do for the network, too.

Initial advances in software-defined networking include SD-WAN, which is poised to grow from $225 million in 2015 to $6 billion by 2020, according to IDC. Yet, SD-WAN has not fully cracked the network performance and security conundrum. SD-WAN still relies on MPLS links to ensure low-latency connectivity, and the use of the Internet is mostly for WAN backhauling and doesn’t fully address the need for secure Internet and cloud access.  This points to the need for a new software-defined approach that firmly binds network and security as one, and which frees up valuable networking resources.