The current global semiconductor shortage reinforces the importance of organisations moving away from a reliance on purpose-built hardware and embracing a software-driven approach.
While hardware will always have a place, it is increasingly becoming just the delivery mechanism for software to unlock any number of use cases. It is becoming more abstract, and in time, a network switch can evolve from a brand name to just a box of ports where software can unlock virtually any capabilities.
And while networking may have traditionally lagged, it is swiftly moving into the software layer.
As we look ahead, we see a seismic shift as more companies start adopting software and open hardware systems, to bring a level of agility and scalability that has until now been unprecedented, into their operations.
It is here where we see our greatest value proposition – our ability to scale globally by leveraging cloud infrastructure, and using software as a platform for innovation, by using the various cloud marketplaces available today, and still giving customers licensing options to meet their budgetary requirements.
We have been and continue to scale more rapidly and easily implement software on top of any established infrastructure because our business is built on a technology forward, software-defined foundation. This is not to say that the underlying hardware layer is not critical. If anything, it becomes a key delivery mechanism for the more agile software to be rolled out on top of it.
Of course, some areas across the continent still need the right infrastructure to be put in place, to provide the foundation for a new, digitally-enhanced operating environment.
Cloud-powered
It is this ability to scale exponentially that only comes from moving away from hardware and leveraging the capabilities that software can deliver.
This is where a cloud network can help ensure that services are rolled out to any part of the world. For us, this means not needing to own any of the underlying hardware being used but rather delivering our innovative software solutions on top of that.
Examples of this include SASE, which is fast-becoming the future of networking security, the overlay connectivity provided by SD-WAN, and cloud security.
With the hardware being pre-built, it is easy to onboard customers rapidly and adopt the software to cater for any use case. This eliminates any hesitancy they might have to migrate their legacy environments into the cloud.
We also take care of the change management to educate employees on how best to use the new technology in their day-to-day. For those companies already in the cloud, our flexibility enables us to work with any service provider to create a completely hybrid cloud-driven approach.
Having this cloud environment in place gives customers the multi-tenanted services they are increasingly expecting from service providers. After all, companies do not care who owns the infrastructure, for them, the only thing that matters is that the technology works and delivers what it says on the proverbial box.
Leveraging OVF (Open Virtualisation Format) software provides for additional growth opportunities that might not have existed otherwise. This open standard for packaging and distributing virtual applications or software run on virtual machines provides the flexibility to cater for just about any customer need.
Being software-driven means we can offer services that organisations still driving purpose-built hardware simply cannot.
Software advantage
For us, it is the software-driven advantage.
What started with MPLS and enhanced VPN services evolved to SD-WAN and now, to SASE and with it, next generation services.
MPLS developments and improvements are dependent on hardware centric technology advances over time. When it comes to the MPLS network, a company will typically receive a firmware update which it manually has to install on all its service routers.
In turn, the update must be tested and configured one node, or device at a time, only for the scenario to be repeated when a new patch is released. And to top it all, some of the new ‘features’ might only be a slight augmentation over what has been offered as the hardware is limited by what it can do considering it is purpose-built.
There is only so much ‘juice’ that can be squeezed out of a specific chipset.
Now look at SD-WAN. This software-driven approach on an open hardware platform can take the CPU cores, disk storage, and RAM to customise the solution for virtually any use case. This can include making it a network, security, and analytics, or a combination of these feature sets. Getting all this from the same piece of equipment is a game-changer and ensures the environment remains as optimised and flexible as possible with the functionality being able to be interchanged as required.
Today, SD-WAN should not be the end goal. SD-WAN is the tool that takes businesses to the real end goal – advanced feature sets like cloud security and rapid deployment capabilities.
From an endpoint perspective, we can integrate with any solutions offering including SD-WAN, SASE, and the like. It is all about providing cloud services and getting users to fully embrace the digital environment.
The technology will also improve and become more efficient as the development cycles get better.
What this means is that companies can get more features that have a direct impact to the business or user experience, without having to change the underlying hardware.
Modernising the network
Modernising the network is a top priority, but with it comes migration concerns, which can be best mitigated by choosing a managed services provider like Redvine to design the architecture, fulfil project management needs, and implement the entire transition. We can also assist in the ongoing operations once the migration is complete to ensure the environment is running optimally.
We encourage organisations that want to embark on their journey to becoming digitally transformed using an innovative software-driven approach, to start with an assessment.