The IoT landscape has been rapidly evolving over the last decade, with new sectors and applications adopting the technology each year. However, the COVID-19 pandemic led to businesses requiring smarter and faster technologies to support satellite offices and distributed operations in the wake of lockdowns and social distancing guidelines imposed by governments worldwide.

This new way of working means that companies now demand flexible and cost efficient network options to complement their cloud operations. Organisations are choosing to partner with Managed Service Providers (MSPs), Internet Service Providers (ISPs), or directly with IT Resellers to ensure business continuity is maintained across the organisation’s increasingly complex network.

Traditional WAN is becoming less prevalent due to its limitations in cloud environments, which can often hinder an organisation’s growth capabilities. As a result, companies are deciding to refresh their WAN and increasingly considering SD-WAN as a solution for a variety of reasons, in line with (post-COVID) longer term requirements for managing distributed operations and employees across a wide area network.

SD-WAN uses software to control the connectivity, management and services between several locations and a central network. It relies on different forms of underlay communication, such as MPLS or ADSL. In addition to fixed line connectivity, there are more and more projects now incorporating 4G and 5G as part of the SD-WAN connectivity piece, for seamless backup, an interim solution to reduce long lead times, and network resilience.

REALISING THE BENEFITS OF SD-WAN AND THE ROLE OF LTE & 5G

SD-WAN adoption was on the rise, even before COVID-19, but the global pandemic has accelerated business’ digital transformation. This has resulted in organisations working with MSPs, ISPs and IT Resellers to ensure connectivity solutions that were deployed at the beginning of the pandemic are sustainable and reliable for the long term. SD-WAN provides WAN simplification, improved performance and lower costs, plus bandwidth efficiency and resilience by using different bearer services that minimise single points of failure across a wide area network.

Furthermore, MSPs, ISPs, and IT Resellers are now able to unify public internet, LTE, private and 5G across a single, virtual and high-capacity SD-WAN solution. Cellular plays an important role in these deployments, acting in the first instance as a back-up to a fixed line, as well as providing the ability to rapidly deploy a connectivity solution where a fixed line is not available.

Retailers in particular are deploying SD-WAN and 4G as a failover solution to ensure uptime, and that they are always alive to transact in stores when a fixed line goes down. SD-WAN’s efficiencies can also benefit smaller deployments, such as satellite offices, and with critical applications such as voice and video. It can help choose the best path depending on latency, jitter and packet loss, and less critical applications can then be load balanced across multiple lines to better optimise bandwidth.

MOVING TO SD-WAN

Initiating an SD-WAN migration can introduce new risks to a business network, but there are a number of steps that companies can introduce to mitigate these challenges. One of the biggest considerations for businesses and their IT partners is security, and it must move in sync with the network. Cloud firewalls are no longer sufficient in today’s increasingly connected marketplace, meaning that companies need to ensure tighter security features are deployed, configured and consolidated for employees to continue working productively, as well as removing potential cyber threats.

Any SD-WAN security strategy that is developed and implemented must also be flexible and scalable enough to meet the organisation’s future infrastructure requirements. What’s more, ISPs, MSPs and IT Resellers can show commitment to IoT security, through regular training, monitoring and auditing for their customers. For instance, the ISO 27001 information security management accreditation demonstrates that the company takes the management of its customers’ data seriously.

Moreover, businesses and their IT partners have the challenge of selecting a cellular network provider. Network resilience and reliability are an important value proposition of SD-WAN, and they need to select cellular providers with the expertise to address challenges such as, which cellular network(s) to select for multi-site deployments, IP addressing and Network to Network Interfaces (NNI’s), plus choosing the right tariff to fit each customer use case. The partners can also help navigate bandwidth management on the device and the need to proactively manage usage and bandwidth on the SIM.

ISPs, MSPs and IT Resellers can partner with specialist IoT connectivity providers to navigate these challenges, as they deliver secure and resilient connectivity across multiple mobile cellular networks under one management platform and bill. Not only does this minimise complexity for businesses, but these experts have the relationships, knowledge and experience to effectively manage such processes, as well as navigate the complexity of providing multiple local mobile network profiles to our customers.

ENABLING A NEW DIGITAL FUTURE

As we move into our post-pandemic landscape, SD-WAN brings businesses much-needed ROI by improving performance, efficiency and operational agility in the longer term. With cellular connectivity integrated into the solution, business leaders have peace of mind that a failover solution is available to ensure uptime, and that networks can be monitored or redirected as needed to improve application availability.

For ISPs, MSPs and IT Resellers, they can bolster their SD-WAN propositions by adding a simple, secure and flexible 4G or 5G connectivity as a backup or as a primary connectivity solution, where a fixed line is not available, from an IoT managed service provider with expertise in the industry.

Whilst SD-WAN delivers a number of benefits, organisations and their IT partners also need to consider the security implications, in addition to choosing the right network for their company. Nevertheless with the help of IoT connectivity providers and as more companies transition to SD-WAN, the migration process should become increasingly easier and more streamlined moving forward.