SDN: Is Here to Stay

In an October 3, 2017 article published in Network Computing, titled: “SDN: Time to Move On,” Gartner Analysts report on the state of software-defined networking and advise enterprises to shift their focus. It has triggered some interesting conversation in the SDN field. As a leading player of SDN technology, we have received several inquiries for comments on the article. While the controversial title grabbed a lot of attention, it’s alarming to many and far from reality. More importantly, it differs from what Gartner reports have concluded.

From what we see in the market, SDN has already landed real use cases and built the momentum to change the production network. However, as Gartner expressed in the reports, we have seen two gaps in adopting SDN: It takes a long time for customers to adopt this nascent technology; and while SDN can be used to solve many imminent issues, it is not a panacea to all networking problems.

According to Gartner, “SDN started as a new technical architecture, but brought into light some valuable concepts that outlived the original blueprint,” Gartner VP Distinguished Analyst, Joe Skorupa and Research Director, Danilo Ciscato wrote. The article also reveals, “The story’s different in Continue reading

SDN: Is Here to Stay

In an October 3, 2017 article published in Network Computing, titled: “SDN: Time to Move On,” Gartner Analysts report on the state of software-defined networking and advise enterprises to shift their focus. It has triggered some interesting conversation in the SDN field. As a leading player of SDN technology, we have received several inquiries for comments on the article. While the controversial title grabbed a lot of attention, it’s alarming to many and far from reality. More importantly, it differs from what Gartner reports have concluded.

From what we see in the market, SDN has already landed real use cases and built the momentum to change the production network. However, as Gartner expressed in the reports, we have seen two gaps in adopting SDN: It takes a long time for customers to adopt this nascent technology; and while SDN can be used to solve many imminent issues, it is not a panacea to all networking problems.

According to Gartner, “SDN started as a new technical architecture, but brought into light some valuable concepts that outlived the original blueprint,” Gartner VP Distinguished Analyst, Joe Skorupa and Research Director, Danilo Ciscato wrote. The article also reveals, “The story’s different in Continue reading

Time to Overhaul Your Campus Network

Over the last few years cloud service providers have steadily adopted white-box Ethernet switches and modern, flexible Network Operating Systems into their ecosystems. Mega data center operators, such as Google, Amazon, and Microsoft, have replaced their proprietary gear with white boxes in their production environments. The major benefit of this paradigm shift is significantly reduced CapEx and OpEx, a more reliable environment, and customized traffic flows for efficiency.  According to IDC, the worldwide ODM direct Ethernet switch (white box) market was $677 million in 2016 and is expected to exceed $900 million in 2017. That’s a growth rate of 33%, and the trend is accelerating.

The shift in white-box adoption started as early as 2012, but has been limited to data centers for many reasons. Even though Enterprise IT executives are motivated to adopt white-boxes, the migration has been slow and challenging. Essentially, the Enterprise network is distinctly different from data center network in many ways.

• The data center network is usually homogeneous, while the Enterprise network is heterogeneous. Typically, Enterprises require a variety of speeds ranging from 100Mbps to 100Gbps, and run over different cables, including various types of copper and fiber. The increasingly deployed Power over Ethernet (PoE) Continue reading

Time to Overhaul Your Campus Network

Over the last few years cloud service providers have steadily adopted white-box Ethernet switches and modern, flexible Network Operating Systems into their ecosystems. Mega data center operators, such as Google, Amazon, and Microsoft, have replaced their proprietary gear with white boxes in their production environments. The major benefit of this paradigm shift is significantly reduced CapEx and OpEx, a more reliable environment, and customized traffic flows for efficiency.  According to IDC, the worldwide ODM direct Ethernet switch (white box) market was $677 million in 2016 and is expected to exceed $900 million in 2017. That’s a growth rate of 33%, and the trend is accelerating.

The shift in white-box adoption started as early as 2012, but has been limited to data centers for many reasons. Even though Enterprise IT executives are motivated to adopt white-boxes, the migration has been slow and challenging. Essentially, the Enterprise network is distinctly different from data center network in many ways.

• The data center network is usually homogeneous, while the Enterprise network is heterogeneous. Typically, Enterprises require a variety of speeds ranging from 100Mbps to 100Gbps, and run over different cables, including various types of copper and fiber. The increasingly deployed Power over Ethernet (PoE) Continue reading

What does it mean that Cisco will sell Software?

Our friend Cisco made a big announcement this week – “Cisco has built a new networking operating system that will allow users to run its most sophisticated networking features on older and lower cost Cisco routers and switches”.

We welcome and are in fact quite excited about this change. This validates the inevitable paradigm shift of the segregation of network hardware and software, and even a big titan like Cisco cannot stop the change.

If you can recall Cisco’s then-CEO John Chambers’ talk in 2015, Chambers dismissed SDN and white box makers, saying “We are seeing no unusual competition in the market, no unusual competition with white-label or white box [vendors], nor will we in the future.” Even in mid 2016, the new Cisco CEO, Chuck Robbins, still maintained the same tough position, stating “There’s a misconception that’s driving the belief that all customers want to buy white box switches”. That was less than a year ago, and the world has completely changed.

So Cisco has changed their opinion. The market is going through a paradigm shift, and I actually admire Cisco’s courage to embrace the changes instead of fighting them. Cisco has been leading the networking industry Continue reading

White Box Switches Have Grown Up

White box switches have come a long way. The recent activities in OCP validate the vision and progress of white box switches, and more importantly it is clear that this trend is progressing from data centers to enterprises. I remember when Zeus Kerravala wrote in his 2016 article, “White Box Switches are Now Ready for Prime Time,” he pointed out three important advantages:

– Cost and reliability
– Features and capabilities
– Network operations

As a NOS vendor, we see NOS is being adopted into production environments. Even though there are still challenges with white box switches going from data centers to other segments, there is no doubt the networking industry has moved onto the path toward white box switches.

From what we saw at OCP Summit, the overall reliability of white box switches is improving, and in many cases, they are more reliable than some brand-name hardware. We can now find dozens of vendors providing white box switches. These vendors come with different backgrounds and carry out different approaches in designing their hardware platforms. In OCP, we can see three clearly different types of vendors providing white box switches:

• Brand name vendors, such as HPE and Dell. This group Continue reading