Cloud services, particularly infrastructure- and platform-as-a-service, are well established, but in some cases customers demand more – more control, more access to hardware, more performance, and the ability to pick their own operating environment.In those cases they are looking to bare-metal servcies, a niche that is growing fast.As the name implies, bare metal means no software just CPUs, memory, and storage. Customers provide all of the software from the operating system on up. That means a dedicated CPU, full access to the hardware, and freedom to run custom operating systems.According to a 2016 Markets and Markets report, the bare metal cloud market is expected to grow from $871.8 million in 2016 to $4.7 billion in 2021, at an estimated compound annual growth rate of 40.1%.To read this article in full, please click here
There is quite a rush on to build out edge computing networks, that vital link between the massive amount of Internet of Things (IoT) devices and data centers. One of the companies involved is newcomer EdgeMicro, which announced plans to deploy micro-data centers in 30 cities around the U.S. for an unnamed cellular partner.EdgeMicro said “a leading North American mobile network operator” has begun verification tests of its technology. It did not name the operator, but if it’s a national operator covering 30 major cities, there are only four obvious candidates — Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint, or T-Mobile.To read this article in full, please click here
It’s been 160 years since the world’s first submarine cable linked a remote corner of Trinity Bay, Newfoundland, with Valentia Island on the west coast of Ireland in 1858. That telegraph cable failed after three weeks, but a new method for transoceanic communications had been established, and today submarine cables are a critical piece of digital infrastructure that’s fast expanding in prevalence and prominence globally – though not yet quickly enough to meet voracious demand for capacity.Between 2013 and 2017, the subsea cable industry has added an average of 32 percent of capacity annually on major submarine cable routes, according to the industry magazine SubTel Forum. Still, the industry needs to do more. “It will have to increase activity to stay ahead of demand,” SubTel Forum said in its annual report this year.To read this article in full, please click here
Microsoft’s on-premise Azure cloud platform, Azure Stack, has now been embedded in real-world, core business environments with early adopters validating business use cases that require secured and host environments. Here are some of the current uses of Azure Stack that are deployed in enterprises.+RELATED:
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Azure Stack in healthcare
Healthcare organizations have been a prime candidate for Azure Stack as they fit the model of having large (extremely large!) sets of data and customers, and also face regulatory policies and protection aimed at securing the data being transacted. Azure Stack fits the mold of providing healthcare organizations the cloud-scale that they wish to achieve, in a protected, managed and secured environment.To read this article in full, please click here
Microsoft’s on-premise Azure cloud platform, Azure Stack, has now been embedded in real-world, core business environments with early adopters validating business use cases that require secured and host environments. Here are some of the current uses of Azure Stack that are deployed in enterprises.To read this article in full, please click here(Insider Story)
Networking IoT devices can be challenging for IT managers because the communications requirements can be very different from those for typical PCs, tablets and smartphones currently connected to corporate networks. +RELATED: Most powerful internet of things companies; What is the industrial IoT? And why the stakes are so high+In addition, there is an incredible diversity of IoT devices and how they are used. For example:To read this article in full, please click here
Businesses and their distributed enterprise locations grow more dependent on connected resources every day. That’s because employee and customer expectations and behaviors are evolving and having quick access to business information or constant connection to personal applications is changing the game for business networks. Every report I see indicates that our dependence on connected systems will continue to skyrocket. In fact, Cisco recently predicted that global IP traffic is set to nearly triple by 2021.To read this article in full, please click here
Super Bowl LII was played about a month ago, and much to the chagrin of New England Patriots fans, the team lost despite a number of records being set by Tom Brady and his team. In a losing effort, the QB threw for over 500 yards, something that had never been done before. Also, no losing team has ever had as many yards or points. It was certainly one of the most memorable games in recent history, particularly for the long-suffering Philadelphia Eagles fans.Records were also set in the stands with new highs in Wi-Fi network usage. For the fifth consecutive year, Extreme Networks was the Official WiFi Analytics provider of the Super Bowl, and its ExtremeAnalytics (formerly known as Purview) captured all the data transferred over the stadium Wi-Fi network. (Note: Extreme is a client of ZK Research.) The NFL and its individual teams have been using the data to better understand what fans do on their mobile devices during games in hopes of creating an overall better experience. Some of the highlights from the big game are listed below.To read this article in full, please click here
Each new Wi-Fi standard has brought significant improvements in performance, with the most recent, 802.11ac, offering an impressive theoretical maximum rate of 1.3Gbps. Unfortunately, these gains have not been enough to keep pace with demand, leading to that exasperated cry heard across airports, malls, hotels, stadiums, homes and offices: “Why is the wireless so slow?”The IEEE is taking another crack at boosting Wi-Fi performance with a new standard called 802.11ax or High-Efficiency Wireless, which promises a fourfold increase in average throughput per user.RELATED:
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802.11ax is designed specifically for high-density public environments, like trains, stadiums and airports. But it also will be beneficial in Internet of Things (IoT) deployments, in heavy-usage homes, in apartment buildings and in offices that use bandwidth-hogging applications like videoconferencing.To read this article in full, please click here
We’ve started to hear a lot about SD-Branch as a natural successor to SD-WAN, which makes sense as the centrally-orchestrated model is attractive to many enterprises. However, just as we saw with SD-WAN, the term “SD-Branch” is being adopted by many different vendors and service providers to mean what they want, in the absence of any “official” definition.What is SD-Branch anyway?
Based on most definitions, SD-Branch means delivering more IT infrastructure to branches under a programmable, centrally orchestrated model. Think of it as “SD-WAN plus” – just as you can create templates or profiles in an SD-WAN network, an entire branch template could be generated that defines how the LAN is configured, what wireless LANs are used, how they integrate with the WAN, and what additional compute-based services need to be deployed at the branch.To read this article in full, please click here
Are you getting the most out of your next generation firewall? Probably not if you take to heart recent research from SafeBreach.SafeBreach, a relative newcomer to the security arena -- it was founded in 2014 -- sells premise and service packages that continually run network breach simulations that help customers locate and remediate security problems.RELATED:
What is microsegmentation? How getting granular improves network security
Illumio extends its segmentation to the network and cloud
Specifically the company deploys software probes distributed throughout customers’ networks, and attempts to establish connections among devices and network segments just as a hacker would do in attacking your data. These breach attempts are defined by SafeBreach’s Hacker’s Playbook, a library of known attack methods that uncover network security weaknesses and how these vulnerabilities might be exploited.To read this article in full, please click here
Are you getting the most out of your next-generation firewall? Probably not if you take to heart recent research from SafeBreach.SafeBreach, a relative newcomer to the security arena — it was founded in 2014 — sells premise and service packages that continually run network breach simulations that help customers locate and remediate security problems.RELATED:
What is microsegmentation? How getting granular improves network security
Illumio extends its segmentation to the network and cloud
Specifically the company deploys software probes distributed throughout customers’ networks, and attempts to establish connections among devices and network segments just as a hacker would do in attacking your data. These breach attempts are defined by SafeBreach’s Hacker’s Playbook, a library of known attack methods that uncover network security weaknesses and how these vulnerabilities might be exploited.To read this article in full, please click here
My new iPhone X actually recognizes me! This is an example of Smart Technology.Most of us are expecting a revolution of products and services that have embedded intelligence or smarts. Medical diagnostic support is being aided by computer intelligence with the goal to improve the physician’s understanding of the patient to improve the diagnosis, therapies and resulting patient outcomes without adding more burden on the clinician. Look at cars – now, autonomous self-driving vehicles have the potential to alleviate congestion and improve the environment in ways we couldn’t imagine.To perform facial recognition, the iPhone X must understand the language of faces. This includes attributes of faces, such as shape of eyes, noses, cheekbones, and jaw. It’s safe to say that any smart system needs to understand the language of its purpose. Self-driving cars must understand the language of driving which includes maps, roads, signs, speed limits, weather, and traffic signals. Smart medical diagnostics need to understand the language of medicine, including possible diagnosis and probabilities.To read this article in full, please click here
The Shannon-Hartley theorem expresses “the maximum rate at which information can be transmitted over a communications channel of a specified bandwidth in the presence of noise.”Translation: wireless data can only travel so fast. But if data rates are finite, how can we support the rollout of Gigabit LTE, and one billion new 5G connections by 2025?Over the next few years, wireless connections will become ubiquitous – not only in our phones, tablets and PCs – but in our home, car and cities, thanks to an unglamorous and often-forgotten RF enabler: the antenna. Far from the laughably chunky antennas of early mobile phones, today’s nearly-invisible antenna systems make high-speed networking possible. They’re evolving as new wireless technologies emerge to satisfy our demand for content on the move.To read this article in full, please click here
Earlier this week, Juniper Networks announced a bevvy of new networking products. (Note: Juniper Networks is a client of ZK Research.) In his blog post about the products, Andy Patrizio did an effective job covering the basics of the news. But left out some important points, and I wanted to make sure those got called out, including Juniper's tagline “multi-cloud ready." Hybrid, multi-cloud is inevitable
As I’ve pointed out in many of my posts, hybrid multi-cloud environments are inevitable for most organizations. Small businesses may be able to build an IT strategy that is all public cloud, but any large company is going to choose a mix of private and public clouds.To read this article in full, please click here
Zwanger-Pesiri Radiology's journey from MPLS to SD-WAN networking began last spring when Joseph Funaro sat down to review carrier contracts that were up for renewal and realized that he could not only save his company money, but also improve network resiliency and his users' application experience.With 24 outpatient radiology clinics throughout the greater New York metro area requesting or transmitting a terabyte of imaging records a day and requiring access to more than 1.2 petabytes of stored patient data, Zwanger-Pesiri, the largest outpatient medical imaging center in the country by volume, depends on its WAN to provide timely, effective patient service.To read this article in full, please click here
Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are two of the latest networking buzzwords being thrown around the industry. The problem is many enterprise network managers remain confused about the real value of these vastly useful technologies.Emerging network analytics services, powered by AI and machine learning promise to transform traditional infrastructure management models by simplifying operations, lowering costs, and giving unprecedented insights into the user experience – improving the productivity of both IT professionals and their users.For network staff, the concept and value of these technologies is extremely powerful if applied to the right problems.To read this article in full, please click here
Juniper Networks has announced an expanded portfolio of products for companies to become “multi-cloud ready,” unifying both the public cloud and on-premises computing resources.The new offerings don’t just connect the data center to the cloud; they also cover campus and branch offices, the latter of which can often be overlooked or forgotten due to being remote.Also on Network World: Cloud strategy: hybrid and multi cloud are not the same
Companies are moving more workloads to the cloud to keep up for a variety of reasons, but a recent study from consulting giant PwC and commissioned by Juniper found that while a majority of enterprise workloads are going to move to the cloud in the next three years, the workload on premises will not diminish. If anything, it will need to keep up with the cloud.To read this article in full, please click here
Wi-Fi is quite fickle. The contention between Wi-Fi devices and the dynamic communication medium of the airwaves makes it a sensitive technology with many settings and situations that can slow it down.And even if you aren’t using high-bandwidth devices and applications, faster Wi-Fi is always better.+RELATED: REVIEW: 5 top hardware-based Wi-Fi test tools; 802.11: Wi-Fi standards and speeds explained+To read this article in full, please click here
My project engineering staff has been getting more and more information requests for Cisco’s new line of Catalyst 9000 switches, especially the 9300 switch. That has me wondering why.Cisco touts the Catalyst 9300 Series as the next generation of the industry's most widely deployed stackable switching platform that’s built for security, the Internet of Things (IoT), and cloud computing. It’s part of a line of network switches that form the foundation for Cisco's Software-Defined Access, its leading enterprise architecture.One reason for the increased interest could be Cisco’s recently announced new intent-based networking system. Cisco believes that by adopting an intent-based approach, networks will be able to deliver a solution that introduces an onslaught of applications and devices that provide greater efficiency and address new security threats.To read this article in full, please click here