By now you’ve probably heard of SD-WAN. It’s a hot buzzword and like other buzzwords, the meaning is often attention grabbing, yet it lacks real substance.
In the case of our Bigleaf partnership, cloud-based SD-WAN is solving problems that were difficult or impossible previously.
We start by leveraging the Bigleaf cloud gateways at telco hotels in the US. The gateways themselves are fully redundant and do not introduce a single point of failure. There is also redundancy between gateways.
We pair this with an on-premises device that goes between one or more ISPs and the existing on-premises firewall. This allows us to seamlessly manage multiple ISPs. We use Bigleaf public IPs on the firewall and have same IP failover, which helps with both site-to-site VPNs and hosting public services on-premises. We continue to leverage the firewall of choice for security.
With the cloud gateways and on-premises devices working together, we are able to prioritize real time traffic like voice over IP (VoIP) and RDS in BOTH directions. This was not previously possible over public Internet connections.
The pairing of multiple ISPs and using both simultaneously makes it practical to buy a small amount of high quality fiber optic Internet bandwidth and buy a large amount of inexpensive coax bandwidth. Satellite Internet can also be leveraged in areas where multiple ISPs are difficult to source. Bigleaf even has algorithms for optimizing traffic over satellite.
Overall, the combination of Bigleaf, fiber, coax and the Microsoft Azure and Office 365 cloud has proven successful with many clients, and looks to see continued growth and adoption!
Check out Bigleaf’s short video for an animated explanation.
Have any questions about SD-WAN and how it can leverage your business? Contact us at any time.
