Aryaka grows its SD-WAN portfolio, adds regional deployments

Aryaka has expanded its suite of managed SD-WAN offerings, and announced its SD-WAN will be available for regional deployments starting early next year.

Aryaka offers its SmartConnect technology as a managed, global SD-WAN service, but now it has added four new as-a-service offerings to its newly branded SmartServices platform. With the SmartServices platform, Aryaka is looking to differentiate itself from the "do-it-yourself" (DIY) SD-WAN offerings from vendors such as VMware as well as the ones offered by service providers through partnerships with vendors such as Cisco.

"This is one of the more significant announcements that we are making from a portfolio change, both in terms of the mix as well as the breadth of what we're bringing to the table," said Shashi Kiran, chief marketing officer, in an interview with FierceTelecom.

According to an SD-WAN report last month by IHS Markit, VMware/VeloCloud continued to lead the pack in the second quarter with the highest revenue share, followed by Cisco/Viptela and Aryaka. While Cisco and VMware have been hard at work over the past few years integrating their Viptela and VeloCloud acquisitions across their portfolios, Aryaka relies on its 28 points-of-presence (POPs) on its private network that spans six continents to serve its customers.

Being a "cloud first" SD-WAN vendor with an emphasis on security and simplicity, as well as the new SmartServices platform, Kiran said Aryaka has an advantage as a technology vendor, and with its "as-a-service" offerings across global SD-WAN, hybrid SD-WAN and regional SD-WAN.

RELATED: Aryaka adds HybridWAN and zone-based firewalls to SD-WAN portfolio

Aryaka announced its HybridWAN solution in September. HybridWAN extends Aryaka's global managed SD-WAN solution to sites where a combination of Aryaka's Layer 2 core connectivity and Aryaka-managed internet connectivity provides customers with more choices.

Aryaka has broken WAN optimization out of its flagship SmartConnect SD-WAN service to offer it as a standalone service called Aryaka SmartOptimize on the SmartServices platform. Aryaka's SmartCloud is a managed multi-networking service for public clouds, software-as-a-service providers and cloud partners, such as Microsoft Azure.

Along the same lines, AryakaSmartSecure is a managed firewall offering for virtual networking functions (VNFs.) While Aryaka's goal is to be firewall agnostic, Kiran said SmartSecure will launch with Palo Alto Networks before adding other firewall vendors.

Aryaka SmartInsights provides customers a view into their services via the MyAryaka cloud portal. With SmartConnect, all five of the services on the SmartServices platform are offered "as-a-service" by Aryaka. The packaged versions of Aryaka's SmartOptimize, SmartCloud and SmartInsights and SmartSecure are expected to be generally available in the first quarter of next year.

Kiran said Aryaka is now able to offer its SD-WAN services on a regional basis with optional application acceleration technology. By using pre-defined clusters in regions such as the United States and Mexico, and Australia and New Zealand, Aryaka can offer a more affordable SD-WAN offering as long as the traffic stays within the context of those regions.

With contract agreements up front, those customers can upgrade to a global SD-WAN service without disruption or the need to change out their hardware.

"There is nothing else to be done other than the service itself just being designated and changed very quickly on the fly," Kiran said. "So the way all of these are structured is that it's very easy to move from one offering to another. Agility is one hallmark of our services and the second one is around simplicity.

"The third (hallmark) is around being able to offer this in a consistent way with multi-cloud connectivity. And to be able to deliver SD-WAN with the consistency of service experience regardless of if its regional, hybrid SD-WAN or global SD-WAN."

Aryaka's SmartConnect regional and HybridWAN offerings will also be available in the first quarter of next year.