Lumen is ramping up its edge compute offerings by introducing the Lumen Edge Gateway that is designed to deliver software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN), security and other IT applications.
The gateway is a multi-access edge compute (MEC) platform that can be used to deliver different types of virtualized services from multiple vendors. It’s available worldwide and is designed specifically for medium to large enterprises, the company said.
The gateway supports SD-WAN and traditional routing from companies such as Versa, VMware, Fortinet and more. It also supports security platforms from Fortinet and Palo Alto.
The gateway comes in a rackmount and desktop form factor and features a dashboard with summary views and virtual network functions status updates.
“With Lumen Edge Gateway, enterprises can consolidate existing applications to run more efficiently on-premises,” said Chris McReynolds, vice president of cloud edge product management for Lumen. “And they can change networking and security vendors without changing equipment.”
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Lumen has been in the process of transforming itself into an edge computing powerhouse. The company has hundreds of edge compute nodes deployed in the U.S. and globally and is combining its fiber assets with security, compute and application management to deliver edge compute services to enterprise customers.
In August, the company inked a $7.5 billion deal to sell off its ILEC assets in 20 states, leaving it with an ILEC footprint spanning 16 states and 21 million addressable locations. In addition, Lumen is in the middle of a big fiber expansion push. Last month it announced that it would expand its residential Quantum Fiber service to 12 million locations over the coming years.