Enterprise networks today carry a much larger burden than they did a decade ago. Wireless infrastructure now supports a constant flow of users, devices, applications, and cloud-based services. It must do all this while staying secure, responsive, and reliable. With demands rising and resources often stretched, many IT leaders ask how they can keep up without sacrificing reliability or user experience.

Network automation offers a practical answer and a real solution that helps simplify complexity, reduce manual tasks, and allow IT teams to focus more on strategy and less on repetitive troubleshooting.

If automating your wireless network and security operations still feels like a risk, you’re not alone. Many organizations share the same hesitation. Yet more leaders are making the shift because they see measurable results and recognize the growing need for smarter, more adaptive wireless network solutions. This approach does not replace your team; it supports them by providing the right tools to operate with greater clarity and confidence.

Let’s discuss how network automation could work in your environment.

Rethinking Wireless

Legacy wireless LANs were designed in a very different era. This was before smartphones, cloud apps, IoT, and remote work became central to the enterprise. These older systems are not equipped to handle today’s dynamic connectivity demands. They also fall short in providing insights across locations or supporting automated decision-making.

Without automation, your team may spend hours manually troubleshooting Wi-Fi issues, reviewing logs, and switching between tools just to locate the source of a problem. This reactive approach drains your resources and limits your team’s ability to focus on strategic work. By contrast, modern wireless network solutions that include AIOps can detect root causes and resolve problems automatically, often before users even notice them.

WEI partner Juniper Networks reports that organizations using AI-assisted onboarding can reduce deployment and operational time by up to 90 percent in new campus environments. For enterprise IT leaders working under tight timelines and limited headcount, this result speaks volumes.

Watch: Winning The Network Game With WEI & HPE Aruba Networking

Making Sense Of Network Automation

How does help organizations take advantage of automation?

Juniper Mist uses a modern microservices cloud architecture that continuously learns and adapts to your network environment. By combining machine learning with real-time telemetry, it automates operations from planning to long-term optimization. This helps your wireless network and security systems work together in a smarter way.

Here are some of the key ways Juniper Mist helps IT teams simplify wireless network solutions and manage operations more effectively:

• Identifying issues in real time using data from access points, switches, and firewalls.
• Accelerating deployments through AI-powered configuration assistance.
• Simplifying troubleshooting by connecting data points from different network layers.
• Improving user satisfaction through proactive resolutions.

Juniper Mist helps your team stop chasing problems and start acting on solutions. Instead of responding to every ticket, your team gains confidence in a system that learns from the network and responds with speed and accuracy.

Addressing Uncertainty Around Innovation

One of the biggest obstacles to network automation is hesitation. New technology often comes with unknowns: Will it work? Is it reliable? What happens if something goes wrong?

That uncertainty is valid, especially when your business relies on consistent uptime. Automation helps reduce this uncertainty by taking the guesswork out of network operations.

Juniper Mist addresses these concerns with practical tools and transparent workflows:

• offer plain-language responses to technical questions. They guide admins through troubleshooting and configuration in a conversational format.
• Self-healing capabilities allow the system to detect and correct issues automatically, based on learned patterns.
• Open APIs make it possible to integrate Mist into your existing tools, eliminating disruption and helping teams keep their workflows intact.

According to Juniper, AIOps can deliver in operational savings. That number reflects more than just cost. It points to time regained, risks avoided, and a workforce empowered to move faster with confidence.

Watch: 5 Reasons Why SD-WAN Works For The Enterprise

Security That Works At Scale

Securing today’s network means more than firewalls. Employees now work from many locations. Devices and apps come and go constantly. Without a modern solution, the risk surface becomes harder to manage.

Juniper Mist brings to the wireless edge. It uses identity-based access controls to define who can join your network and what they can access. This helps limit threats and enforces safety at scale. Whether onboarding IoT devices, managing BYOD environments, or granting access to contractors, Mist ensures each device follows the correct policies.

This kind of network intelligence builds trust with your security team. You can protect your organization without slowing down innovation or user experience.

Real-World Impact You Can Measure

IT leaders who adopt Juniper Mist and similar wireless network solutions report measurable results:

• Deployment speed increased by up to 90 percent in greenfield projects
• Support tickets related to wireless connectivity dropped by as much as 90 percent
• Operational expenses fell by up to 85 percent due to less time spent on troubleshooting
• Security posture improved through identity-based segmentation and policy enforcement

These results show that automation is not just a technical upgrade. It is a strategic tool for enabling better outcomes across the enterprise.

Final Thoughts

Network automation with Juniper Mist transforms more than just your IT operations. It helps your organization respond faster, work smarter, and support users with confidence.

If you are considering a shift to an AI-powered wireless network solution, make sure you work with a team that understands both the technology and your business goals. WEI, a proven Juniper Networks partner, offers the expertise to guide you through every phase from strategy and design to implementation and ongoing support.

Ready to take the next step? Let’s talk about what network automation could look like for your organization. WEI’s team is here to walk you through it, answer your questions, and help you build a wireless network and security strategy that actually works for you.

Next Steps: Greater visibility and better security tools are needed to ensure the Zero Trust network environment that companies desire. Additionally, hybrid networks have evolved far beyond the basic composition of a public cloud and on-prem environment.

WEI’s free tech brief identifies the three main components of HPE Aruba Networking’s powerful EdgeConnect Enterprise platform.  to access your free copy of the tech brief, SD-WAN: 3 Components To Efficiently Connect Users To Applications.

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Years ago, disaster recovery discussions focused primarily on whether it was necessary. Organizations looking for basic off-site data protection sought solutions that allowed for on-demand backup and retrieval of VMs from the remote location. However, remote replication doesn’t equate to disaster recovery. For true failover protection, you need a true Disaster Recovery solution option that allows VMs to operate directly from the remote site. Businesses now realize the difference and are implementing DR to preserve their business operations during a disrupting event.

In today’s era of digital transformation however, basic recovery is no longer sufficient for businesses to maintain continuity. Modern disaster recovery solutions must not only facilitate rapid failover but also ensure that operations during recovery are as efficient as the normal day-to-day activities in the primary environment. As a result, organizations now strive to eliminate bottlenecks not just in their regular network operations, but also in their disaster recovery processes. The goal is to achieve seamless transition and performance during failover, mirroring the efficiency of standard operations. This approach ensures that businesses can maintain designated productivity and service levels even in the face of unexpected disruptions.

Watch: Achieve A Game Winning Strategy With WEI & Nutanix

The Nutanix Difference

Nutanix recognizes this need, which is why they’ve taken a more innovative approach to DR that addresses these modern challenges. While Nutanix offers a complete data replication option, it also offers a true disaster recovery option that separates itself from the competition. Unlike traditional approaches that rely on specialized hardware or custom Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs), Nutanix’s DR solution is software-based. This approach offers several key benefits:

1. Hardware Independence: The solution can run on a wide range of standard x86 hardware, making it easier to maintain DR capabilities across diverse environments.
2. Greater Flexibility: Being software-defined allows for greater flexibility in adapting to new and evolving DR requirements without hardware constraints.
3. Enhanced Scalability: The system can grow in sync with your operations without complex hardware-specific configurations.
4. Cost-Effectiveness: By leveraging commodity hardware, Nutanix often provides more cost-effective DR solutions compared to systems requiring specialized hardware.

Nutanix employs a distributed replication strategy across its entire system. In this architecture, each node in the Nutanix cluster manages a portion of the overall metadata, with all nodes processing metadata through a software-defined system. This balanced, distributed metadata approach is key to Nutanix’s scalable and efficient DR solution:

• Workload Distribution: Prevents any single point of failure or performance bottleneck.
• Parallel Processing: With metadata distributed across nodes, operations related to DR (like replication and snapshot management) can be processed in parallel, which improves overall performance.
• Scalable Performance: As new nodes are added to the cluster, the metadata processing capability scales linearly, ensuring that DR operations remain efficient even as the system grows.
• Reduced Network Traffic: Since each node has access to a portion of the metadata locally, it reduces the need for constant inter-node communication, which is particularly beneficial in DR scenarios where network bandwidth might be constrained.

Supported Deployment Options

The distributed architecture of the Nutanix DR system supports several architectural options. Choosing the appropriate deployment model is your first decision:

• Two-Way Mirroring: Workloads are mirrored between sites, ensuring both can handle active traffic. In other words, Site B is the data protection target for selected workloads running on Site A, while Site A serves as the target for Site B.
• Hub-and-Spoke: This many-to-one model is ideal for organizations seeking to centralize replication across multiple sites. It’s particularly well-suited for enterprises with Remote and Branch Office (ROBO) setups. In this configuration, multiple remote sites (spokes) replicate data to a central location (hub).
• Cloud Connect: Enables organizations without an offsite backup location to leverage public cloud services, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), for cloud-based disaster recovery. With , you can deploy a Nutanix cluster in a public cloud environment which will provide the same level of data protection and disaster recovery capabilities as on-premises deployments.
• Single-Node Backup Target: Nutanix offers a cost-effective single-node backup solution tailored for small and mid-sized businesses. This solution leverages the same underlying disaster recovery technology used in Nutanix’s larger deployment models. It provides protection against single-drive failures and supports native end-to-end backup processes.

General Best Practices

Once you have decided on the best deployment model for your needs, here are some general best practices:

• When using a single node backup target, limit protection domains to fewer than 30 VMs and limit backup retention to a three-month policy. Nutanix recommends a policy that includes seven daily, four weekly, and three-monthly backups.
• Use Cloud Connect for workloads with a log change rate and limit each protection domain to one VM to speed up restores. Set recovery point objective (RPO) no lower than four hours.
• Other best practices include storing all VM files on Nutanix storage to maintain consistency, scheduling snapshots during off-peak hours to minimize performance impact and grouping dependent applications into consistency groups for .

Final Thoughts

For more best practices or to explore cutting-edge DR solutions and determine the best fit for your organization’s needs, reach out to WEI today. Our dedicated disaster recovery engineers are available to discuss innovative options and best practices tailored to your business requirements. Schedule a consultation to learn how you can enhance your DR strategy with the latest technologies and approaches.

Next Steps: A leading federal credit union faced aging infrastructure, rising costs, and scalability challenges that jeopardized the reliability of its critical systems. To modernize its IT environment, they partnered with WEI to deploy a Nutanix-based hyperconverged solution, replacing outdated hardware and ensuring future growth with enhanced disaster recovery capabilities. Downloadand learn how WEI can transform your IT infrastructure!

The post Maximize Your Nutanix DR Strategy With Exclusive Expert Insights appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Reliable, seamless connectivity is essential for modern organizations, whether managing a bustling campus or a dispersed branch network. In these environments, prioritizing performance, reliability, and user experience is vital.

Recent advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have introduced exciting developments in network management, especially in wired and wireless LANs. These are not just enhancing connectivity; they are revolutionizing it. Let’s explore how these technologies shape how we connect in today’s fast-paced world.

Understanding The Need For Advanced Network Solutions

Campus networks are important across various sectors, extending beyond educational institutions to corporate environments. As organizations expand, the need for reliable campus network solutions comes into focus. It’s essential to address potential issues proactively to ensure minimal user disruption. To achieve this, wired and wireless LAN systems must be operationally reliable.

Similarly, branch networks require flexible and dependable solutions to meet the diverse needs of businesses. Advanced network systems should guarantee that all remote locations have the same connectivity and performance as the leading campus network.

Embracing this new era of connectivity means staying ahead of potential challenges and providing consistent performance across all types of networks.

Why Choose AI-Driven Campus And Branch Network Solutions?

Emerging technologies are revolutionizing how organizations manage their networks, transitioning from reactive to proactive strategies. This shift notably improves the efficiency and performance of wired and wireless LANs, campus and branch networks, delivering significant benefits across various domains. Here are the key advantages of this evolution:

1. Improved UX: With AI-powered solutions like Juniper’s Mist AI, network management transcends traditional monitoring. These solutions proactively identify and resolve issues, ensuring seamless operations for employees and customers. This forward-thinking approach, driven by AI insights, is a game-changer in network management, anticipating potential problems before they disrupt operations.
2. Enhanced business operations: AI-powered automation, such as Juniper’s solutions, simplifies repetitive tasks like configuring and troubleshooting. By automating these processes, IT teams can redirect their focus towards strategic initiatives, boost efficiency, and reduce costs, especially in branch networks where resources may be thin.
3. Performance: AI integrates data from both wired and wireless LANs to provide a comprehensive view of network health. Real-time data analysis and autonomous fixes secure consistent and reliable performance across campus and branch networks. This reliability is crucial as organizations expand their network infrastructures.
4. Scalable and secure networks: AI-driven campus network solutions facilitate effortless scaling by streamlining the addition of new access points and switches. Advanced AI security features protect wired and wireless LANs by identifying and mitigating threats in real time. This integration allows campuses and branches to expand smoothly without sacrificing performance or reliability. For example, Juniper’s centralized management platform simplifies adding new devices.

Advanced Wired And Wireless LAN Solutions

Organizations must establish that their networks can meet the demands of an increasingly interconnected world. Juniper Networks offers advanced wired and wireless LAN solutions to deliver secure, scalable, high-performance connectivity for campus and branch networks. These solutions leverage the power of AI to simplify network management, enhance security, and provide seamless scalability. Let’s explore how Juniper’s solutions address the challenges faced by modern networks and empower organizations to achieve reliable, high-performance connectivity.

1. Wired LAN

Managing a wired LAN can be complex, especially in large-scale environments like campus networks or multi-site branch offices. Juniper relieves the burden of complex network management through the following benefits.

• Simplified management: Juniper’s cloud-based interface simplifies the configuration and monitoring of wired LAN networks. IT teams can easily manage and troubleshoot the entire network from a centralized platform, improving operational efficiency. This single-pane-of-glass approach reduces administrative overhead and minimizes the chances of human error.
• Enhanced security: Security is a top priority for any organization, and Juniper’s wired LAN solutions provide reliable protection. Built-in network access control guarantees only authorized devices can connect to the network, protecting sensitive data from unauthorized access. Additionally, AI-driven security features continuously monitor potential threats and proactively mitigate risks before they impact network performance.
• Scalability: As organizations expand, their network demands grow. Juniper’s wired LAN solutions are designed with scalability in mind. Whether adding new users, devices, or applications, these solutions can quickly adapt to accommodate increased traffic and device density without compromising performance. This maintains your network’s reliability and efficiency, even as your organization’s needs grow.

2. Wireless LAN

As more businesses and institutions embrace wireless technology, providing reliable connectivity across diverse environments becomes increasingly essential. Juniper’s wireless LAN solutions offer the following features to deliver a seamless user experience across campus and branch networks.

• Reliable connectivity: Juniper’s high-performance access points deliver consistent wireless coverage, even in high-density environments like university campuses, office buildings, and conference centers. With advanced features like beamforming and automatic frequency adjustment, these access points deliver reliable connectivity for all devices, even in the busiest, most demanding environments.
• Advanced analytics: One of the standout features of Juniper’s wireless LAN solutions is the integration of Mist AI, which provides advanced analytics to track wireless client performance. This AI-powered platform collects data on user behavior, network performance, and device interactions, offering actionable insights to optimize the network. IT teams can use this data to identify potential issues before they impact users and ensure the network is operating at peak performance.
• Customizable policies: Network administrators can define custom policies to prioritize critical applications or devices, ensuring optimal performance for business-critical operations. For example, a company could prioritize video conferencing applications over less critical traffic to guarantee smooth communication during important meetings. This level of control allows organizations to tailor their networks to meet specific needs and demands.

Redefining Network Management With AI

At the heart of Juniper’s wired and wireless LAN solutions is Mist AI. By continuously monitoring network performance and user behavior, Mist AI helps organizations proactively manage their networks, minimizing downtime and improving overall efficiency.

• Marvis Virtual Network Assistant: Juniper’s conversational AI tool simplifies network troubleshooting. Using natural language processing, allows IT teams to interact with the network more intuitively, asking questions and receiving actionable recommendations. This reduces the time spent on troubleshooting and will enable teams to address issues more quickly, enhancing overall network reliability.
• Network insights: Mist AI offers powerful network insights by analyzing metadata from both wired and wireless LANs. This analysis helps detect trends, identify potential issues, and predict future network performance. Organizations can make informed decisions about capacity planning and performance optimization by better understanding the network’s health.
• Bluetooth integration: Juniper’s patented antenna array supports Bluetooth-based services, enabling location-based applications such as asset tracking and personalized customer engagement. This integration enhances the value of your network by allowing organizations to deliver innovative services beyond traditional connectivity.

Maximizing Productivity And Business Outcomes

Juniper’s AI-driven campus and branch network solutions help organizations achieve increased productivity, improved user satisfaction, and long-lasting scalability. Whether in education, healthcare, or business, these solutions help organizations stay ahead of the curve through the following:

• Improved productivity: Reliable connectivity is essential for fostering collaboration, both within organizations and between remote teams. Juniper’s wired and wireless LAN solutions keep employees and students connected to critical applications and resources, minimizing interruptions and optimizing workflows.
• Enhanced user satisfaction: AI-powered network management minimizes disruptions and proactively resolves issues. This leads to a better overall user experience for students in a campus network or employees in a branch office. Maintaining a stable, high-performance network boosts satisfaction and promotes higher organizational productivity.
• Future-ready infrastructure: As technology continues to evolve, so do the needs of organizations. Juniper designs its network solutions to scale with your business, making sure your network infrastructure stays agile and adaptable to future advancements. By embracing AI-driven solutions, organizations can future-proof their networks, making them more resilient to changing demands and ensuring long-term success.

For instance, Juniper’s network solutions provide a stable foundation for students and faculty where uninterrupted access to learning resources is vital in educational institutions. Similarly, in a corporate environment, Juniper’s AI-powered branch networks enable reliable connectivity for remote employees and ensure that business operations run smoothly regardless of location.

Final Thoughts

AI-driven solutions for wired and wireless LANs offer a transformative approach to managing campus and branch networks for organizations navigating the complexities of modern connectivity. With innovations like Juniper Mist AI, these solutions optimize network performance, enhance reliability, and elevate user experiences across diverse environments.

As you look to enhance your campus and branch networks with advanced solutions, having the right partner makes all the difference. WEI’s expertise in technologies like Juniper Mist AI will enable your organization to achieve seamless connectivity, superior reliability, and future-ready scalability. Contact WEI today to unlock the potential of AI-driven networks and build a scalable, future-ready infrastructure.

Next Steps: Higher education institutions are constantly looking for ways to attract and retain students. Beyond impressive facilities and engaging curricula, providing a seamless digital experience has become a crucial differentiator. At WEI, we understand the need for modernizing college networks to meet the evolving demands of digitally-savvy students.

Transform your campus network with WEI’s AI-native approach. Download our comprehensive tech brief, to learn how we can help you modernize your college network, ensuring a competitive edge in attracting and retaining students.

The post How AI-Driven Network Solutions Better Enable Campus And Branch Operations appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Modern higher education campuses rely on a strong digital infrastructure. As each incoming graduating class grows more technically savvy and more devices and applications become integral to learning, universities and colleges require high-performance networks to support the needs of students, faculty, and staff while safeguarding sensitive data from cyber threats.

Technology plays a crucial role in almost every aspect of higher education. However, managing this complex IT environment can be overwhelming for campus IT professionals. This article examines the three essential pillars of a successful higher education IT strategy: infrastructure, connectivity, and security. We explore how institutions can address these challenges by leveraging industry-leading technology and partnering with trusted collaborators.

Evolving Higher Education IT Solutions

IT infrastructures in higher education have evolved beyond just providing basic internet access. Today, universities must deliver seamless connectivity across campuses, support a growing number of devices, and ensure that both academic and administrative functions operate efficiently.

These requirements demand advanced higher education IT solutions that address specific challenges such as:

• Reliable connectivity: Students, faculty, and administrators demand uninterrupted access to online resources, learning platforms, and administrative tools.
• Device management: With the rise of mobile learning and BYOD (bring your own device) policies, universities need solutions that allow them to manage and secure an ever-growing number of endpoints.
• Cloud integration: As more applications move to the cloud, campuses need networks that can support cloud-based services without sacrificing speed or reliability.

By working closely with technology partners, institutions can leverage the latest advancements in network infrastructure, connectivity, and security to meet their evolving needs.

Building A Scalable Foundation

As student populations and digital demands grow, scalable network solutions become essential for higher education institutions. Many colleges and universities struggle with outdated networks that cannot accommodate the increasing traffic or devices. A scalable solution allows the network to grow in tandem with these demands, ensuring consistent performance across the entire campus. This includes:

• Data center optimization: Modern data centers are the heart of campus IT operations. Here, you can consolidate resources, leverage virtualization technologies, and implement efficient cooling and power management solutions for cost savings. Tools like Infrastructure as a Code (IaC) can automate data center provisioning and configuration, streamlining management and reducing risks.
• Scalable network solutions: Campuses are dynamic environments with ever-increasing bandwidth demands. Scalable network solutions like software-defined networking (SDN) offer the flexibility to adapt to changing network traffic patterns and support future growth. SDN empowers you to centralize network management, simplify configuration, and dynamically provision resources based on real-time needs.
• Unified communication: Facilitate seamless communication across departments and locations with a unified communication platform that integrates voice, video conferencing, instant messaging, and collaboration tools. This fosters faculty-student interaction, enhances administrative workflows, and simplifies collaboration on research projects.

WEI recognizes the importance of scalable infrastructure in ensuring that higher education institutions stay competitive and efficient. For example, through our partnership with NERCOMP, we support universities by providing custom solutions tailored to their unique needs to help them build future-ready networks.

Reliable And Secure Connectivity

Reliable network connectivity is the backbone of any thriving digital campus, ensuring smooth operations across academic and administrative functions. To achieve seamless connections, institutions should focus on several key strategies:

• High-performance wired and wireless networks: Equip classrooms, labs, dormitories, and common areas with dependable wired and wireless networks. Implementing a high-density Wi-Fi solution is crucial as students and faculty bring an increasing number of devices to campus, requiring fast, reliable connections to support learning and collaboration.
• Secure network access control (NAC): A strong network access control is essential for managing and securing network access for authorized devices. NAC solutions help prevent unauthorized users from gaining access, reducing the risk of malware, data breaches, and other security threats.
• Network segmentation: By segmenting the campus network into separate zones for different user groups (e.g., students, faculty, administrative staff, and guest users), universities can enhance security. This approach limits access to sensitive data and critical resources, minimizing the impact of potential security breaches and improving overall network efficiency.

Integrating these strategies ensures that institutions maintain a reliable, scalable, and secure network infrastructure capable of supporting the demands of a modern higher education campus.

Prioritizing Campus IT Security

Educational institutions are increasingly vulnerable to cyberattacks due to the vast amount of sensitive data they store. A successful breach can disrupt operations, compromise sensitive information, damage reputation, and incur significant recovery costs.

To mitigate these risks, campus IT departments must prioritize comprehensive security strategies. This includes:

• Automation: Automating tasks like vulnerability assessments, patch management, and threat detection and response allows IT teams to focus on strategic initiatives.
• Data encryption: Encrypting data both at rest and in transit ensures confidentiality even if it’s intercepted.
• Multi-factor authentication (MFA): MFA adds a layer of security by requiring users to verify their identity beyond a username and password.
• Security awareness training: Educating the campus community about cybersecurity best practices helps prevent human errors that can lead to breaches.
• Zero trust security: This model assumes no user, device, or application is inherently trusted, requiring continuous authentication and authorization.
• Threat intelligence: Leveraging AI and machine learning, modern security systems can detect and respond to threats in real time.

As WEI’s long-time partner, offers solutions that incorporate these elements, providing automated threat detection and response mechanisms to help institutions proactively protect their valuable data.

Final Thoughts

Higher education institutions face complex IT challenges, but by taking a holistic approach to infrastructure, connectivity, and security, they can build a resilient digital foundation that empowers learning and innovation.

Partnering with trusted collaborators like WEI and industry leaders such as Juniper Networks is essential for achieving this goal. These partnerships empower IT professionals to implement cutting-edge solutions that safeguard sensitive data, enhance network performance, and stay ahead of emerging cyber threats. By leveraging the expertise of these industry leaders, universities can ensure their infrastructure not only meets current needs but also supports future growth and innovation.

Invest in our solutions now and pave the way for your institution’s technological progress and long-term success.

The post Discovering Smart And Scalable Network Solutions For A Future-Ready Campus appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

In my previous article, I wanted to show people what SASE is, what SASE is NOT, what ZTNA 2.0 means, and how this architecture and mindset can benefit your organization. Here, I want to take things to the next step and discuss the common pain points that lead customers towards a SASE solution as well as help answer any key questions that may lead to a network/security/WAN transformation.

Finally, I wanted to remind anyone reading this article: The SASE help you need is here! Now, let’s dive in.

Customer Pain Points? Enter SASE!

Many enterprise networking environments today have legacy networking and security production environments, consisting of various point products (many of which are managed separately and do not correlate data together as a platform), mostly due to budget constraints and organic growth over time, with users and perimeters everywhere.

There are also greenfield, hybrid greenfield, and brownfield environments that need guidance and a solid framework to navigate today’s growing security concerns and threat landscape.

WEI Workshop: How SASE Will Transform Your Network & Security

Remember, we have an ever-expanding attack surface, an ever-expanding company perimeter (this includes every user and application), most employees are off site, and most of your data is off site and in the cloud/SaaS applications. Each of these factors produce data leaks, which results in one giant perfect storm when trying to secure data!

Today, there are many security and WAN/network transformation issues which companies are faced with, including:

• ZTNA (Zero Trust Network Access): You might have many security point products (firewalls, URL filtering appliances, IDS/IPS appliances, etc.) and wonder if these products in your environment are built upon the 5 pillars of ZTNA (least privilege access, continuous trust verification, continuous security inspection, protection of all data, and protection of all applications). , a viable SASE product ought to be architected and built upon the 5 pillars of ZTNA.
• Costs: Rising year-over-year costs for networking and security infrastructure, which only increases when you have to maintain many security appliance point products. This includes firewalls, outdated URL filtering appliances, explicit proxy appliances or services, WAN edge routers, an IDS/IPS appliance, a CASB (cloud access security broker), an RBI service (remote browser isolation/enterprise web browsing)…the list is endless. Admins need to upgrade these items, maintain patching, power, and cooling for appliances. Each device or service has its own licensing, configuration console, etc. These devices can be considered legacy, possibly missing the mark on security needs. Replace them, start the process today and downsize the number of manufacturers in your environment!
• Breaches: The looming fear of breaches/security events, issues affecting your environment, and not knowing if the products in your environment are secure or even industry compliant. Do you have the best practice security recommendations configured? Do you have a product that prevents known and zero day (unknown) malware?
• Client VPN
  • Having the need to replace legacy insecure client VPN solution(s): Legacy VPN solutions likely only have the ability to allow [mobile user traffic, whatever that is and where it is destined to], then ignores user traffic such that, once connected, the user can access anything in the enterprise networking environment. Further, these mobile users are not verified by technologies such as two-factor or machine authentication. Authenticating the actual desktop that the user is using to connect to your environment ensures that this device is a company certified asset prior to user authentication. What to do if the user has a BYOD device that is connecting to your environment? How do you posture check this device, how do you ensure that certain internal user groups only have access to certain applications (and not others) while other internal user groups only have access to other applications? What to do if the user is an outside contractor requiring limited access to targeted applications to only perform certain specific functions?
  • Infected Desktops: What happens if a VPN user connects to a corporate environment with an infected or non-compliant machine? What happens if VPN user’s desktop becomes infected while connected to the corporate environment?
  • Solid User Experience: Most client VPN connections in today’s enterprise network environments are backhauled to one HQ or data center site to a firewall. The data is processed from that egress point out to the Internet or to a remote branch. What happens if the user is in California then VPNs back to a data center in New York, only to then have the data go to a website in San Francisco? Or worse, what if the users are not in the U.S. but need to VPN back to one site in the U.S. just so that security can be applied? So, when a user connects to your corporate environment via client VPN, how do you mitigate adverse factors to ensure a solid user experience without latency, jitter, or delay? Because of this, admins opt to use “split tunneling” to improve mobile user experience. This way, the mobile user traffic can route back to a corporate office when needed, but go to the Internet via the mobile user’s home Internet connection. Problem solved, right? Not so fast! Now, the admin can no longer secure the mobile user’s Internet traffic (or at least making this more difficult, prompting the admin to buy yet another point product or cloud service to solve this issue). Also, there still might be latency getting to applications etc., but now the admin has zero visibility, bringing us to our next issue.
• Lack of Visibility: If mobile users encounter broken connectivity, intermittent jitter, delay, packet loss, or overall slowness getting to one application but not another, or latency when accessing all applications then how and where do go to you triangulate the root cause? What if you want visibility into user traffic, the applications they are using, and the applications they are experiencing latency in? You also may want to identify why the latency is occurring, when it is happening, and the frequency of the reported latency.
• WAN Transformation: What if, during your WAN transformation, you want a guaranteed performance increase/uptime for users and applications? There is an increasing need to completely transform the Wide Area Network (WAN) due to expensive leased lines (MPLS specifically), while eliminating single points of failure and building in resiliency which was never there before, while safeguarding against application brownout where chatty bandwidth intensive applications can “starve” out the traffic from other applications. This causes jitter/delay/latency or even outages with little or NO visibility into the root cause, while possibly bonding WAN links together as one overlay while securing traffic as it moves between networks (“East-West”) at each branch and data center.
• Staying or Going: Most companies, especially since the pandemic, have branches with expiring equipment, expiring licenses, expensive maintenance/upkeep/rent/real estate, etc. Are there branches you can “sunset”? If so, you can save on the aforementioned costs. If so, you’ve also increased your mobile user headcount.
• Expanding and Contracting Mobile User Headcount: Wouldn’t it be easier to have one service that is architected to sustain an expanding and contracting headcount of on-prem users and mobile users?
• Sprawling Corporate Perimeters: Today, fewer people travel to the office five days a week. This means one thing: more mobile users and increased reliance on private or public SaaS (software as a service) applications. When your users are working on the road or from home, each office is still a perimeter. But, now, each user becomes a corporate perimeter (multiplied by the number of users) because each desktop (and each individual desktop data connection to the Internet and back to corporate) must be secured. You also have SaaS applications with data containing your personal or corporate intellectual property. This is your company’s “secret sauce” which is simply “out there” living within applications that you have no control over. Your network and perimeters are now sprawling out of control with no strategy to “herd all the cats” to get all your data secured via one service, while doing so with as little latency as possible. Regarding the SaaS applications, what if you want to know who that information is being shared with and where it has gone recently? Does it contain malware? Who has rights to access it via download, who can upload data, or who should not have rights to access this information? Every user and every application is a corporate perimeter. Never forget that the frontline is everywhere…literally everywhere your employees are.
• Global Connectivity: WHAT IF on a GLOBAL basis, you want to interconnect all your mobile users/remote branches/data centers together while securing SaaS applications, while performing DLP for application traffic, while having visibility into all traffic traversing this service, WHILE doing all of this securely/preventing known malware and zero day malware with a product which is deployed GLOBALLY (so, wherever the user is, wherever the branch or data center is, the SASE service is local to YOU!), while managing this SASE service with one GUI?

Ask Yourself And Your Team The Tough Questions

• List out your current pain points about your network and network security. What keeps you up at night? What does the company really value and what is core to the business? What do you like and dislike about your current network and network security? What is preventing you from achieving your transformation and security goals?
• What does “ZTNA” mean to your organization? I defined ZTNA in my previous article, but what does it mean and how does it impact YOU?
• Does your organization have a consistent security posture which can be easily implemented for all users, all mobile users, all sites, all applications everywhere?
• Then, ask yourself: Why make changes based on your business initiatives? What is the technology gap you are faced with? How do those issues map to meet or miss business goals? What is your ideal business outcome and why solve it now? What is the risk of doing nothing vs. strengthening your network and security posture ASAP?
• Regarding the risk of doing nothing, always remember: an exploit (an attack sequence used by an attacker) targets a vulnerability (flaw in the software targeted by the attacker that, when targeted, produces a result intended by the attacker but unforeseen by the customer) to create a code execution (aka, deploy malware code and executables). What is your organization doing, right now, to prevent known and zero-day malware? And how do you know that it’s working? How do you even know whether or not you, your co-workers, or your entire organization has been breached? Typically, no one ever knows. If they do find out, it is typically a minimum of 60 days after the fact. Most breaches happen silently. Why would the attacker want to alert anyone? They don’t want to interrupt what they’re doing while they continually interrupt what you’re doing! Why let them leach off you for free? These people are on your payroll and you don’t even realize it. Fix the glitch!
• How can I proactively mitigate the inception and spread of zero day malware in real time at the “front door” so I can stop being reactive to the spread of malware?
• Are you drowning in log spam and have no way to figure out the alerts to focus on? Which alerts correlate together?
• Why are you considering one vendor vs. another and do they fully cover ZTNA 2.0? Do they fully mitigate zero-day malware?
• How many workers do you have worldwide? Including contractors, what is the projected number 3-5 years from now? Which geographic locations do they reside in? Where will they be in the future…traveling, perhaps? How many remote workers at peak times? Do workers need to “phone home” back to your company or do they access SaaS applications directly via the Internet? How is mobile user data kept safe while the user is at home or traveling?
• When a user is remote, is VPN enough security? How is a user and their device authenticated?
• Least Privilege Access and Continuous Trust Verification: Can I trust users (identity by User-ID and Group-ID) and devices to access specific applications and internal or Internet based corporate resources the entire time? Are users doing the right things while connected? How do you know? How do they know?
• How do you ensure that “X” group of users can only access “X” group of applications? Same question regarding contractor access to your organization! How do you police this?
• How many branches do you have, are all of them staying or going? Do you have legacy edge appliances at the Internet edge at the branches? How do you enforce security either way? How much bandwidth is needed at each branch? Do the branches need to access each other? How do branches access the data centers? Is that access sufficient or does it need improvement? Are you currently backhauling (user/branch) data connections and causing unnecessary latency? Are you prioritizing business critical and latency-sensitive application traffic?
• Can you perform micro-segmentation at the branch?
• Do remote workers need to access the branches and data centers, or just the data centers?
• How are you enforcing security when people and applications “scatter”? How do you know?
• How are you networking to and reaching applications in the Data Center/reaching Cloud or Internet applications?
• Most companies use SaaS applications. Which SaaS applications does your company use and rely on today? Is access to every application allowed for every user? Is access to all data in the application allowed for every user? Which applications are trusted and for which users/which applications are blocked for certain users and not others? Which applications are blocked for all users? Which applications are tolerated? How are applications used? How is the application set up and is it set up securely? Where is your data going? Is it being shared elsewhere? Does it contain malware? Do you know and do you have visibility into all of this? What about Data loss (leak) prevention? What about policy recommendations and compliance for applications and access to sensitive data?
• For Internet or cloud-based applications, do you have per-application/per-user visibility when things go wrong intermittently?
• Are you doing SSL/TLS decryption at scale without oversubscribing your resources?
• If you want to change your security and WAN architecture, can you implement this security quickly, everywhere, at hyper-scale, cost friendly, and without oversubscription?
• Lastly, remember: Most people feel that the product priced the lowest wins. This is exactly the wrong mentality when it comes to security. Think to yourself: what if the company gets breached? If so, the brand, the name, and the entire company is at risk and with it, all of our data is at risk. How much would you pay to secure your data, your intellectual property, the “secret sauce” of the products you sell? How much is all of that worth (hint: there’s no way to quantify this)? What keeps the owners of the company up at night? Does your current security solution keep pace with the threat landscape? The best idea is to buy a product that is scalable and mitigates zero day malware!

Real World Examples

Let’s consider two scenarios: (1) a legacy enterprise network without SASE and (2) that same network transformed with the power of SASE.

Legacy Network

Please see the network diagram below. This diagram is a composite of several real-life legacy networks observed over the years.

(click to enlarge)

This is a complicated diagram. Simplifying it, let’s go over what we see:

• Mobile Users: Several hundred or even several thousands of mobile users using desktops of various operating systems. While at home, the mobile users have insecure, unfettered access to the Internet. The mobile users use client VPN to connect back to the “Boston” site. They are dispersed throughout various geographic areas in North America (average latency to connect to Boston from Southern California: ~70-one00ms), several in Europe (average latency to connect to Boston: one00-200ms), Asia and India (average latency to connect to Boston: 300ms). Most mobile users are internal “trusted” employees. Some mobile users are external contractors. All users need to connect back to the “Boston” site (corporate HQ) and the “Penn” (data center) site to access resources, such as private applications, remote desktop sessions, etc. But, these connections are backhauled, causing latency. Mobile users are allowed to connect, trusted, allowed, then their traffic and connections are ignored by admins.
• Branches: Branch users connect to the Internet via their local ISP. Two branches have “next-gen firewalls” (UK, Pakistan). Several branches either connect to the Internet via routers or legacy firewalls (China, India, Africa, Brazil). All branches connect back to the Boston and Penn sites via expensive MPLS connections. The global MPLS contract expires in 8 months. The company is trying to decide whether or not to keep MPLS. Several branches will be going away soon. All users at those branches will become mobile users. Branches connect to each other via site to site VPN if MPLS is down. Certain branches have full legacy SD-WAN connectivity to each other if MPLS is down, but they do not have backup connections to other branches. All branches backhaul connections to Boston and Penn sites, causing latency.
• SaaS Applications: All users (mobile users, branch users, Boston users, Penn servers) connect to the Internet via their local ISP. Consequently, they connect to their public SaaS applications via their local ISP as well. Most of the company’s intellectual property is “housed” within these SAAS applications with no security and no visibility into who is accessing what.
• Is there next-gen L3 through L7 security? Very little in this environment.

Now, let’s briefly dive into the issues with this network:

• Many different types of WAN edge devices at each branch. This is a cobbled WAN with no consistent WAN backup link strategy. Admins manage each device one by one, causing inconsistent security policies and complications leading to human error. When branches reach other branches (moving East-West), they do so mostly without firewall enforcement, meaning that a malware outbreak will be allowed to happen.
• Branches and mobile users backhaul connections to Boston and Penn. This causes network-wide latency.
• Branch WAN edge devices do not have the capability to route applications over specific links or apply QOS (quality of service) or any other type of priority based on mission critical or latency sensitive applications
• Branches connect to each other via MPLS. MPLS is an expensive legacy WAN technology. Further, branches could be connecting to each other using both MPLS links and Internet links, bonding both links together. Thus, there are expensive WAN links and very little security.
• Mobile users are allowed to connect to any resource on the Internet, to any branch and to any SaaS application. This is “allow and ignore”. This is a security breach waiting to happen!
• Each branch, data center, HQ, user desktop is a perimeter. Perimeters expanding out of control. There is no inline security inspection.
• If there is intermittent latency when accessing a SAAS application, it can be impossible to triangulate the root cause due to lack of user and application visibility.
• There is a long overdue, dire need for WAN transformation and ubiquitous next-gen L3 through L7 security with SaaS Security and ZTNA 2.0

The Same Network Transformed With SASE

This is the same network as above transformed with SASE. Please see the network diagram below.

(click to enlarge)

• Site-to-site VPN and WAN Transformation with SD-WAN: Backhauling site-to-site traffic is eliminated completely as all site-to-site traffic traverses the SASE service. Combining multiple WAN “underlay” links (ex. Internet and MPLS links, secondary and tertiary Internet links) as primary and secondary “overlay” paths while prioritizing mission critical and latency sensitive applications. Eventually, admins can remove expensive WAN links, replacing them with more cost effective links. All site-to-site WAN traffic traverses the FWaaS feature of the SASE service, preventing East-West malware outbreaks
• Mobile User Transformation: Although mobile users are geographically dispersed, the SASE service is local to each user within their geographic region. This eliminates backhauling of mobile user connections (client VPN, clientless VPN, SDP, explicit proxy etc.) to a regional headquarters site. Mobile user desktops are posture checked to ensure that they are trusted devices with software updated to certain patch levels, etc. Mobile users are authenticated, via a central user database, then challenged with “two-factor” authentication. Mobile user traffic to branches/data centers/Internet traverses the FWaaS, keeping mobile user traffic secured. Mobile users are segmented such that certain user groups can access certain applications while other user groups can access other applications but not applications used by another user group, etc. Contractors only have access to certain applications.
• Cloud-Delivered Next-Gen Security as a Service with ZTNA 2.0 (Least Privilege Access, Continuous Trust Verification, Continuous Security Inspection, Protect all Data, Protect all Applications over any protocol): Zero-Day Malware Prevention/FWaaS/SWG/Explicit Proxy* (depends on the vendor, not a requirement for SASE but a “nice to have”/CASB/client and clientless VPN)
• Scalable SSL/TLS Decryption: for your environment, globally, without risk of oversubscription!
• Operational Efficacy, via One Management Console: Your environment GLOBALLY and Local everywhere. Elastic, scalable, redundant, and five 9s uptime.
• Visibility with DEM: To help organizations monitor and improve application and user experience with the ability to triage packet loss, jitter, delay and latency for each user accessing each application while traversing the SASE service by monitoring each application session, testing performance and collecting data to be used to triage issues
• SAAS Security with CASB and DLP: Protection of SaaS applications from cyber threats/application posture/identity based application security/data governance. Sanctioning certain applications. Blacklisting unsanctioned applications. Tolerating certain applications. Inspection for data at rest, data in motion (upload/download), remediation of misconfigured security settings in sanctioned applications via continuous monitoring. Detailed application use analytics and visibility. Enforcement of who gets access to what data. DLP (data loss prevention) to prevent intellectual property from being accessed by unauthorized users/data discovery/who owns the data and policy for that data, who will get in trouble if that data is leaked? How is the data classified?

Help is Here!

All these issues can be solved by one SASE service which can deliver features such as: Firewall as a Service (FWaaS) to secure mobile user traffic/branch to branch/branch to data center/branch to Internet/mobile user to branch/mobile user to data center/mobile user to Internet traffic/prevent known and unknown malware outbreaks, delivering SD-WAN for optimal application prioritization and WAN transformation, CASB and SAAS Security with DLP, visibility into all traffic traversing the SASE service with “DEM” (digital experience management monitoring). This product can replace many appliances and point products. The product can deliver ZTNA 2.0 and can be managed via one GUI as one cloud-delivered, scalable, global SASE service. Imagine, one perimeter to meet your security needs to help you transform your network, while helping to solve and prevent security issues on an environment-wide globally scalable basis!

SASE takes your network from technologies that worked well in the 1990’s, the 2000’s, the 2010’s and earlier in the 2020’s, then systematically layers features on top of the service to arrive at the ultimate goal of YOUR enterprise network security built within the ZTNA 2.0 framework. SASE is “Networking and Security 2.0”.

Always remember: With SASE, the goal is SECURITY and WAN transformation, not simply access or set it then forget it! Oftentimes, network and security engineers connect their users and environment to a SASE service, add a few firewall rules, then call it a day. This is exactly the WRONG thing to do. Establishing connectivity to a SASE service is only the first step in your journey to achieving ZTNA 2.0.

Worth reiterating: If you’ve only deployed the “Secure Access” part of SASE, you have begun. But, never forget that you are only at the ground floor as far as accomplishing the ultimate goal, which is to the secure that edge! Do mountaineers stop climbing once they reach Everest base camp? No, and protecting an enterprise network environment demands collective action and trust is a vulnerability. Once connectivity has been established to a SASE service, you must take advantage of the “Service Edge” functionality or you are not using the product to its full advantage to protect “DAAS” (data, assets, applications and services). Keeping going until you have consumed all of the features at the “Service Edge” layer of SASE that you need for your environment.

When protecting your environment, do NOT forget about SaaS Security and DLP. Do NOT “kick the can down the road” on this. If you are not securing users, applications and the data which users can access, you are NOT and never will be doing ZTNA 2.0. Use the features at your fingertips. They work! And, they will not cause interruptions when deployed properly.

If your organization has these challenges, your organization should consider SASE:

• Geographically dispersed mobile users/need strict authentication/need posture checks/”allow and ignore” stance toward user traffic but has a desire to move towards tight mobile user security
• Need for secure, yet limited contractor access
• Several branches, data centers and HQ locations, all geographically dispersed and Backhauling Traffic
• Business Growth (users and locations)! Or sporadic growth at times (elasticity!)
• Need to remove or combine usage of expensive WAN links, but also want to do East-West Security across a WAN = Need for WAN transformation with micro-segmentation at the branch
• Branch or office downsizing = increase in # of mobile users and need for app security!
• Any customer who does not have consistent Security Posture everywhere or have a Security Strategy
• Need to secure SaaS apps with Visibility into user and application traffic
• Any customer whose attack surface is expanding (expanding perimeter) and they do NOT have a handle on it!
• Striving towards a ZTNA 2.0 security posture

Do you need help in your journey to SASE, SaaS Security, WAN transformation, ZTNA 2.0 or any of the features mentioned in this blog? Please reach out to either myself or any of our cybersecurity experts. Let’s meet in person for a conversation on how we can help. Thanks for reading!

Next steps: Watch WEI’s webinar focused on Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto

The post Deep Dive: How SASE Redefines The Enterprise Perimeter appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Just as you rely on business-critical applications every day in the workplace, those same applications rely on a network that is available, scalable, and secure. But if an enterprise’s network architecture falls on the traditional side, this can complicate matters with the utilization of middleboxes like firewalls, load balancers, and tunnels for packet forwarding. This complexity comes with a high cost, hindering the deployment of new applications and creating challenges for intensive workloads like supporting video or connecting a widespread mobile workforce.

Many legacy networks lack the capability to operate on this session-based model, resulting in suboptimal networking. Despite efforts to secure networks, security breaches and cyberattacks persist, with predicted annual costs reaching . The traditional setup exposes businesses to sophisticated cyberattacks, incurring unacceptably high downtime costs. Fortunately, a solution is available to address both workloads and security issues in the enterprise network.

Addressing Network Performance With Session Smart Networking

Juniper Networks’ provides session-level intelligence and security to the network. This solution, built on an application-aware and zero-trust secure network fabric, meets enterprise requirements for performance, security, and availability.

, when integrated into an SD-WAN solution, enhances collaboration between the network and supported applications. It also connects users to exceptional experiences by dynamically charting waypoints across the network. This process constructs a streamlined and secure application-centric fabric, facilitating a comprehensive understanding of source users, network segments, and destination applications.

Utilizing AI To Boost Network Security

AI is a major topic worldwide, whether you are an IT professional or not. And with cybersecurity initiatives full steam ahead for many of the customers we serve, the convergence of these two areas is inevitable as next-gen security requires AI. The Juniper AI-Driven SD-WAN solution prioritizes security throughout the entire SD-WAN fabric to minimize exposure to evolving threats. This involves:

• Service-Centric Control Plane: Combine a service-centric control plane with a session-aware data plane to provide IP routing, policy management, client-to-cloud visibility, and proactive analytics.
• Zero Trust Models: These models offer the advanced design of the Session Smart Router, replacing the traditional routing plane with security principles at the core.
• Session Understanding: The Session Smart Router processes sessions – dedicated links between services, applications, users, and devices.
• Service-Centric Operation: Operating in a service-centric manner, Juniper models services for specific applications, granting access based on shared policies and validated templates.
• Granular Security Control: This intelligence enables granular security controls, assigning policies, QoS parameters, and access controls on a per-service, per-network basis.

Juniper’s AI-Driven SD-WAN not only addresses evolving threats, but also revolutionizes network security by integrating it seamlessly into the core of the network infrastructure.

Components Of Juniper Networks’ Zero Trust Model

Session Smart Networking relies on Zero Trust Security (ZTS) to ensure no packet is above suspicion. Juniper’s service-centric fabrics transition from legacy perimeter-based security to a zero-trust model incorporates the following components:

1. Zero Trust Routing Fabric: This session-oriented approach assumes no trust for users, traffic sources, or connected networks, regardless of location on the network. The Session Smart Router is deployed to establish zero trust and service-centric fabrics, where routes are transformed into directional firewall rules using a deny-all routing model. All routes and sessions undergo authentication, and session traffic is dynamically encrypted end-to-end.
2. Application-Centric Hypersegmentation: This feature categorizes user groups and devices into fine-grained per-service access policies using a global network data model. Hypersegmentation operates independently of overlay networks. This leverages the existing network infrastructure across public/private network boundaries, broadcast domains, and administrative boundaries.
3. Native Session Stateful Security Functions: The Session Smart Router simplifies branch and data center security architectures by natively supporting session L2-L7 stateful firewall functions, including NAT, encryption, VPN, and traffic filtering. The Advanced Security Pack enhances security with intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDS/IPS) and URL filtering.
4. Security Policy Automation and Scale: The solution centrally manages application-centric and user knowledge-based security policies, all expressed in the language of business. This results in automated and simplified network security policy management, reducing security operational expenses and overall risks associated with user error. The management system is scalable across thousands of sites.
5. Secure Edge Functionality: protects web, SaaS, and on-premises applications and is integrated with AI-Driven SD-WAN and Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) functionality. Secure Edge connectors facilitate seamless integration with cloud-based security services such as Secure Edge, zScaler, and others.

Final Thoughts

In a world where cybersecurity threats are ever-present, Juniper’s Session Smart Router and AI-Driven SD-WAN sets a new standard for enterprise networking. The future of networking is not just about connectivity; it’s about building a secure, intelligent, and resilient foundation that empowers businesses to thrive in the digital era.

Contact our experts at WEI to learn more about Juniper Networks’ Session Smart Networking and AI-driven SD-WAN.

Next steps: This white paper by WEI identifies how Juniper Networks’ location-based networking helps higher education institutes overcome complex technology challenges. Readers will better identify:

• Concerns of higher education IT professionals
• Why network infrastructure is a differentiator
• Challenge of improving remote experiences
• Value of a virtual network assistant

The post Boost Security And Performance with Juniper Networks’ Session Smart Router appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Just like many other industries embracing digital transformation, the healthcare sector is also on a transformative journey. Many local hospitals and clinics that were once buried in paperwork have hopped aboard the digital train via the cloud. This move is motivated by the goal of improving patient care, making patient information easier to access by patients and their families, enhancing treatment outcomes, and streamlining business operations.

Unfortunately, streamlining networks, effectively investing into the cloud, enhancing security, and integrating AI pose distinct challenges for the already busy healthcare sector. alleviates those worries so healthcare workers can focus more on their patients than their computers.

Juniper Network’s Five-Point SD-WAN Strategy

Juniper Network’s AI-powered SD-WAN, utilizing the Juniper Session Smart Router and Mist AI, enhances software-defined WAN capabilities for advanced healthcare networks. It handles edge traffic, optimizing performance and cost-effectiveness while eliminating the need for tunnels, thus meeting rigorous healthcare industry standards. This empowers healthcare organizations to expedite cloud migration, which improves operational efficiency for better patient care. These benefits span various digital healthcare applications, including:

• Cloud Services
• IoT Systems
• AI In Medicine
• Telehealth
• Smart Facility Management

1. Enhancing Healthcare Security And Compliance With A Cloud-Centric Solution

The adoption of public cloud for healthcare involved transmitting protected health information (PHI) over the internet, which posed major security risks. To comply with like HIPAA, HITECH, and GDPR, healthcare organizations are now embracing cloud-based security solutions to enhance data protection.

Juniper’s delivers security and hyper-segmentation without the traditional encryption protocols. This technology offers several features:

• Deny-All (Zero Trust) Routing implements a zero-trust approach for every network connection.
• URL Filtering blocks malicious websites and content.
• L3/L4 Denial-of-Service (DoS)/Distributed DoS (DDoS) Protection maintains system and service integrity in the event of cyberattacks.
• Payload Encryption protects data and other sensitive information during transmission.
• Network Address Translation (NAT) And VPN Functionality enable secure communication within the healthcare ecosystem.

Implementing these measures reduces data loss, mitigates malicious attacks, and boosts trustworthiness for both PHI and IT infrastructure.

2. Guaranteed Network Availability With AI-Driven SD-WAN

Network failures can disrupt patient-saving care and daily healthcare operations. Organizations are now turning to AI-driven SD-WAN to maintain uninterrupted access to critical applications during cloud migrations and mergers-and-acquisitions (M&A) activities.

Juniper’s Mist AI ensures network availability through the following means:

• Traffic Steering optimizes data flow for healthcare applications.
• Session-Aware Routing operates at the network’s edge to reduce latency.
• Failover Protection redirects traffic through alternative paths in the event of a link failure or ISP outage.
• Service-Centric Routing simplifies migration of workloads to the cloud and the integration of networks during M&A activities, without service disruption or complex router configurations.

These features help healthcare organizations maintain critical application functionality and reduce disruptions. This is especially notable during an era where many healthcare organizations across the country are working through M&A

3. Optimizing Healthcare Experiences By Meeting SLAs

Efficient IT operations in healthcare improve service quality and user experience by intelligently managing traffic, maintaining service levels, and using AIOps for issue detection and resolution. Juniper Mist AI is leading the way to ensure service quality and user satisfaction through the following:

• Traffic Prioritization based on user application requirements. In healthcare, there are many clinical and non-clinical applications with varying degrees of requirements.
• Tunnel-Free Architecture for enhanced network visibility and efficient end-to-end session monitoring.
• WAN Assurance, which provides users with metrics to assess healthcare workers’ experiences.
• to deliver comprehensive insights for IT users to quickly identify and address issues.

4. Streamlining Healthcare Network Expansion

Expanding healthcare networks, especially during complex mergers and clinic location expansion, is a challenge. To enhance agility, healthcare organizations should prioritize cost-effective routing protocols and centralized network configurations.

With , IT operators can simply manage the entire network stack (wired, wireless, and WAN) from a single platform. This streamlined setup includes zero-touch provisioning and advanced templates for quick deployment at multiple sites and clouds – something WEI is very familiar with.

5. Maximizing Cost Efficiency

Cost containment in healthcare IT goes beyond saving money; it’s about future proofing. Juniper Network’s AI-powered SD-WAN streamlines network and cloud migrations, so organizations can enjoy cost savings and improved data transmission efficiency. In a time where ROI metrics are more pivotal than ever, IT teams can accurately forecast these savings for major cloud and network migrations. This translates well to other key stakeholders within a healthcare organization.

The resulting cost savings free up IT budgets for innovation, a vital aspect in an ever-evolving healthcare sector.

Final Thoughts

Juniper Network’s solution empowers healthcare IT leaders, delivering exceptional network experiences for clinicians, staff, and the patients they serve while simplifying operations and enhancing security. Thanks to Session Smart Router and Mist AI, it optimizes performance and cost-effectiveness, ensuring fast and secure data access and migration. This allows healthcare workers to focus on operational efficiency and top-quality patient care.

To dive deeper into Juniper Healthcare IT Networking, reach out to WEI and discover the future of healthcare network management.

Next Steps: Whether you are responding to evolving workloads and performance needs or changing scalability and resiliency requirements, chances are your enterprise will undergo a data center migration at some point. Download our white paper, and learn:

• The challenges of inevitable data center migrations
• How to incrementally build and validate blueprints
• How Juniper Apstra executes your intent
• Apstra automated data center deployment service

The post These Five Strategies Can Help Accelerate Healthcare Digital Transformation appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Businesses must be flexible to meet the demands of customers, streamline processes, and pivot to evolving business needs. Just as enterprise networks have evolved to handle and virtualize the wider distribution of data, applications, and users, the evolution of wide-area networks (WANs) takes the network edge to the next level.

WAN presents an exciting opportunity for transformative change, particularly in the cases of LTE and 5G wireless WAN (WWAN). Whether these networks are in permanent or temporary locations, they have the potential to significantly expand a business’s ability to respond quickly to operational and customer needs.

Elements Of An Effective Wireless WAN

Wireless WANs are an effective solution for a wide range of business needs, including pop-up locations, outdoor operations, IoT networks, and redundant high-availability devices. Here are four foundational benefits:

1. Agile And Resilient Connectivity: Wireless WAN deployments provide . In a study by research firm , WWAN was shown to enhance network availability and reduce annual downtime by 62% to 88% when used by organizations in . With the rise of dual carriers like LTE and 5G, cellular connectivity has become a reliable and flexible solution for industries relying on large file transfers, video streaming, and augmented reality for productivity and enhanced customer experiences.
2. Quick Deployment And Clear Visibility: What makes WWAN a primary choice for organizations is its seamless cloud-based management and swift, zero-touch deployment. Equipped with pre-inserted SIM cards, wireless WAN simplifies wireless router setup to eliminate downtime and minimize costs. This allows IT teams to focus on secure provisioning, monitoring, and control of devices from anywhere.
3. Policy-Based Network Traffic Shaping: WWANs support various optimization scenarios, as these act as a backup for your internet to ensure consistent connectivity. The best part is, WWANs utilize policy-based routing and dynamic path selection. This means it’s possible to combine wireless and wired connections, which makes your network more reliable, and saves you from dealing with numerous local ISPs.
4. Enterprise-Class Security: Through features like VPN, firewalls, and threat management, WWANs enhance network security in locations like retail stores and offices. This ensures data is protected from source to destination on the network.
   Additionally, WWANs improve visibility into network activities, protect sensitive data, and thwart potential cyberattacks on diverse traffic types, including point-of-sale terminals, video surveillance, HVAC systems, and IoT devices. This advantage is especially valuable when integrating new devices or applications at branch locations, as it doesn’t disrupt existing security zones and protocols.

Advanced wireless routers simplify the addition of secure and flexible network connections, improve branch security, and optimize network operations for organizations. Fortunately, solutions like of Ericsson Enterprise Wireless Solutions are available to help your organization achieve these objectives.

Ericsson’s Comprehensive Hybrid WAN Solution

As the networking requirements in various settings and locations continue to grow in complexity, organizations are challenged to fulfill these demands without burdening their IT teams or adding costly network components.

Ericsson offers the following hybrid WAN features:

1. Multiple WAN And LAN Options: The all-in-one hybrid WAN routers support 5G and LTE and offer compatibility with multiple modems, carriers, Wi-Fi, wired options, and Bluetooth.
2. Built-In Network Security Layers: Enterprise Wireless solutions for fixed sites offer a zone-based and application-aware firewall, content filtering, intrusion detection and prevention systems (IPS/IDS), and optional zero-trust networking services. These enable direct access to web, SaaS, and cloud traffic without additional appliances or management systems.
3. Improved Application Uptime And Performance: With SD-WAN features embedded in the solution, businesses automate path selection and efficiently optimize network traffic. This provides enterprises with reliable application performance even with varying signal strength or latency.
4. Centralized Control: IT teams can streamline network management, troubleshooting, and security across multiple locations with . This frees up time for other business priorities and reduces overall costs.

In today’s , Ericsson offers a straightforward solution for accessing and deploying connectivity from any location, without the usual complexities.

Final Thoughts

To meet the growing demands of modern, connectivity-dependent environments, organizations must maximize the value of wireless WAN by opting for a customized all-in-one subscription like Ericsson .

At WEI, our experts specialize in offering valuable advice and assessments for your current network infrastructure. By embracing networking solutions that align with your business requirements, organizations open possibilities for growth and innovation. Contact us today to get started.

Next steps: Next Steps: Watch our video to learn even more on why wireless WAN is the next step to replacing legacy WAN solutions for your fixed retail location. 

The post How This Four-Point Hybrid Solution Transforms Wireless WAN appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

In the competitive world of technology, one of the biggest challenges for IT leaders is adapting to evolving tactics and changes in network connectivity. This is similar to professional sports, as offensive and defensive schemes often change during a season due to trending playbook wrinkles. Team leaders that deploy dated scheming eventually fall behind in on-field play and their win-loss record will reflect this. In the world of IT, outdated network architectures and middleware lead to more serious burdens with hindered device management and security. As a result, many enterprises can’t fully enjoy the benefits of cloud technologies and digital transformation.

Just as there are sports teams behind the curve, there are companies falling behind in the era of multi-cloud networks and hybrid architectures. These enterprises still rely on legacy network topologies, technologies, and middleware that served them well for more than a decade. Consequently, they are unable to fully exploit the benefits of their acquired cloud technologies. For instance, many organizations still rely on legacy hub-and-spoke networks that cannot accommodate the dynamic workloads and diverse data flows that dominate the modern enterprise. 

Other IT leaders are still relying on scattered VPN tunnels that are highly inflexible and reduce application performance. Many are also burdened with middleboxes, in the form of routers, firewalls, VPN appliances, etc. These elements require individual configurations and maintenance, adding to the workload of overwhelmed IT teams.

A New Game

IT leaders are searching for a new way of doing things. This includes routing traffic and robust security that doesn’t disrupt business operations. In this era of multi-cloud networks and hybrid architectures, Juniper’s provides a game-changing solution. The integrated service presents an entirely software-based platform to seamlessly merge with your existing setup, eliminating the need for complex and expensive forklift upgrades.

The Need For A Session Smart Network

With Juniper’s solution, your network becomes responsive and efficient, enabling seamless communication and data flow in your organization. This empowers your business to embrace cloud technologies, modernize your network infrastructure, and adapt to evolving challenges effortlessly.

Juniper Session Smart SD-WAN brings a plethora of benefits that can revolutionize your business and propel you ahead toward digital transformation. Here are some of the trending benefits that stood out for us:

1. Reduced Operational Expenses: Juniper Session Smart SD-WAN streamlines operations by minimizing labor-intensive tasks like manual configurations. As a result, companies enjoy significant cost savings.
2. Enhanced Network Structure: The platform facilitates easy access to SaaS-based applications through its efficient and effective network structure. Enterprises can then enjoy smoother and faster access to cloud-based services, enhancing overall productivity and user experience.
3. Streamlined Network Design: Juniper Session Smart SD-WAN offers an optimized solution for utilizing SaaS-based applications, ensuring data flows seamlessly and elevating the overall network performance. This opens the door to smoother and faster access to cloud-based services, improving efficiency and productivity across your entire network infrastructure.
4. Effortless Onboarding: The implementation process is quick and cost-effective. With zero-touch provisioning and an onboard process that automatically configures itself, your organization can seamlessly adapt to a new network setup.
5. Simplified Management: Network management is effortless with Juniper’s comprehensive LAN/WAN/SD-WAN solution, and the best part is all of it can be found in a single cloud platform. Their streamlined Wi-Fi points, switches, and SD-WAN gateway devices optimize resource allocation and empower your organization to focus on more strategic initiatives.

Juniper Session Smart takes routing to a new level by intelligently aligning workloads with session policies and network status, resulting in a 50% improvement in bandwidth utilization. Session Smart SD-WAN’s tunnel-free architecture ensures service-centered performance, simplified operations, and .

AI-Powered Network Assurance

Juniper AI WAN Assurance, powered by , is an extensive solution that brings real-time analytics, proactive anomaly identification, and swift issue resolution to your network.

Through continuous telemetry data collection and event correlation, Juniper SD-WAN directs sessions with performance and security SLAs in mind. This approach enhances network efficiency for an optimal user experience, making your business operations more productive and responsive.

Data from multiple sources, including Juniper Mist Access Points, Switches, Session Smart Routers, and Firewalls, provides end-to-end insight into user experiences. These devices work with Mist AI to optimize user experiences from client-to-cloud, covering tasks such as:

• Automated event correlation
• Root cause identification
• operations
• Network assurance
• Proactive anomaly detection

Additionally, – Juniper’s AI-driven virtual network assistant – empowers your team with deep insights and fast remediation for network teams. With Juniper AI WAN Assurance and Marvis’ assistance, your network gains real-time analytics. That way, your team can maximize network performance and address challenges proactively.

Final Thoughts

If your network is suffering from sluggishness and unresponsiveness due to outdated legacy architecture, it’s time for a game-changing move. With Juniper’s innovative solutions at your fingertips, you can bid farewell to the limitations of legacy systems and unlock the true potential of modern networking. Embrace Juniper’s Session Smart SD-WAN to revamp your network performance and ensure seamless responsiveness.

Speak with one of our experts at WEI to learn more about the power of Juniper’s Session Smart Network and AI-driven network assurance. We can provide valuable advice to empower your business with a more efficient and cost-effective network structure. Don’t let your network hold you back. Take charge and propel your business to new heights with Juniper’s Session Smart SD-WAN.

Next Steps: This white paper by WEI identifies how Juniper Networks’ location-based networking helps higher education institutes overcome complex technology challenges. Readers will better identify:

• Concerns of higher education IT professionals
• Why network infrastructure is a differentiator
• Challenge of improving remote experiences
• Value of a virtual network assistant

The post Top 5 Reasons to Embrace Juniper Network’s AI-Driven SD-WAN appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Enterprises everywhere are leveraging their computer networks to attain a competitive advantage for not just operational efficiency, but also employee satisfaction. Network information systems are being utilized to improve communication and collaboration amongst employees, increase productivity, and accelerate decision-making.

By collecting, storing, and analyzing large amounts of data, companies gain insights into customer behavior and market trends that allow them to act preemptively ahead of their competitors. In a time when economic inflation is on everyone’s mind, digital technologies are streamlining business processes to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and achieve pricing advantages.

Today’s Modern Campus

Being that WEI is a technology services and solutions provider, you may assume that our use of the word “campus” refers to the campus network that connects an institution’s devices within a specific geographical area. These campus networks are typically comprised of multiple interconnected subnets, each one serving a specific building or building cluster within a comprised area.

On the other hand, when we talk about today’s modern “campus” we aren’t just talking about technology. We’re also referring to the modern college campus. A traditional college campus requires connecting thousands of students with their instructors and peers to nurture ideas and promote learning. The modern college campus provides students and faculty access to shared resources such as computers and servers, as well as theaters, workout facilities, public gathering places, and sporting arenas. The campus network and the college campus have a lot in common: higher education institutions can maximize their effectiveness to engage students and ensure their success by fusing these two campus concepts together.

A Location-based Network And Community

The tentacles of a college campus is similar to a township that includes residents, retail businesses, restaurants, government services, administrative offices, and public gathering spots. There can be lots to do with so many connected experiences, and that’s what brings us to location-based networking (LBN).

LBN utilizes location data to connect people with other users or resources nearby. Anyone with a smartphone is familiar with the concept of using Google Maps for instance. You can find all the pizzerias within a five-mile area, identify their serving hours and average wait time. You can share your location with your closest friends who might be nearby. Many restaurants provide their customers the ability to pay their bill with their phone. This holistic experience is what students desire as prefer a digitally-connected community.

5 Ways LBN Helps Transform The Campus Experience

Prospective students have grown up with the concept of LBN whether they are technologically minded or not. They expect it, which is why colleges and universities must provide the LBN experience to attract and retain students. WEI has identified five ways that LBN improves and maximizes the campus experience:

1. Provide location-specific information such as the location of classes, events and services. Students can check the expected wait times for the local cafeteria or student services. They can reserve study rooms or check real-time availability. School service managers can also analyze traffic data to adjust hours as needed, saving the school both time and money.
2. Improve campus safety by allowing students and faculty to report safety concerns or suspicious activity quickly and easily. They can receive real-time alerts about potential safety hazards, impending weather, or area emergencies. Notifications can alert all connected users within a designated area of a building or campus area and provide instructions on how to respond.
3. Increase social connectivity and collaboration amongst students and faculty. Students can be matched with peers that share common interests while remote learning students can interact with their professors just as well as those in the classroom.
4. Improve resource allocation by providing real-time asset tracking to school administrators and managers, giving them the ability easily locate an asset and analyze its utilization history.
5. Increase participation rates for school events, clubs, and other offerings through push notifications to students based on their location and interests.

The Juniper Location-based Campus

Juniper Networks has proven success in developing and delivering LBN solutions to higher education institutions. Find out how schools such as and the are leveraging location-based networking to fully maximize and leverage the campus network to provide modernized, streamlined, connected digital experience for students and faculty. It is why every college needs the .

Next Steps: This white paper by WEI identifies how Juniper Networks’ location-based networking helps higher education institutes overcome complex technology challenges. Readers will better identify:

• Concerns of higher education IT professionals
• Why network infrastructure is a differentiator
• Challenge of improving remote experiences
• Value of a virtual network assistant

The post 5 Ways Location-Based Networking Improves The College Experience appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

With so much to offer, is the ultimate network management platform for any enterprise. This all-inclusive solution provides users with a variety of tools that integrate into their networks and enable functions such as automation, virtualization, and security. Additionally, it helps simplify complex hybrid architectures across multiple campuses or remote branches while also providing connectivity solutions for IoT devices. By utilizing this sophisticated system at its core, businesses have access to an unprecedented level of control over their digital infrastructure. Keep reading to discover this solution’s eight key benefits and how it solves network challenges for your business.

1. Automate Workflows

Cisco DNA Center is a powerful tool that helps businesses streamline their operations and automate workflows across multiple domains. In 2022, of network activities were less than 25% automated. Automation is a crucial part of network management because it eliminates human error from the equation and ensures uniform configurations for increased security. Automation also allows resources to be deployed quickly in response to real-time demand.

2. Intent-Based Networking (IBN)

With an ever-increasing number of users, devices, and applications, network management is complex. To make this easier to manage in terms of business goals, DNA Center with IBN brings together a controller-led approach that captures these objectives for automated policies across the network. This system then continuously monitors performance levels against desired outcomes so any problems can be corrected quickly before they cause disruption.

3. Cisco DNA Center Is An Inclusive Platform

This network management solution is an open platform that serves as the foundation for digital network architecture. This tool not only supports current Cisco components such as routers and switches, but also works with third-party devices through its multi-vendor software development kits and integrates with other management tools, via an .

4. Total Visibility With The Cisco DNA Center Dashboard

DNA Center is the essential hub for managing modern, hybrid networks. It provides IT administrators with a that includes features for:

• Application 360
• Device 360
• Client 360

These capabilities enable administrators to gain visibility into network performance while quickly isolating any issues from application problems – ensuring an optimal end-user experience. Plus, the granular information Cisco provides help with troubleshooting at every level.

5. Improve Performance And Deployment Time

With Cisco DNA Center and its automation capabilities, AIOps is now achievable for managing networks. Organizations may take advantage of the available, integrated SD-WAN tools to quickly deploy remote branches without being onsite. Plus, enterprises gain increased visibility and build resiliency into operations which makes life easier for IT teams, users, and businesses alike.

6. Smarter Network Performance Solutions

Cisco DNA Center leverages to provide predictive insights into network performance, so businesses can stay ahead of user behavior, application requirements, and operational needs. With these powerful predictions in hand, network administrators can identify issues quickly and solve them efficiently while improving the end-user’s experience on the network.

7. Boost In Security

In today’s world, cybersecurity is an essential part of any network management solution. Cisco’s platform provides a secure and intelligent intent-based network with real-time threat detection by transforming all your devices into sensors that monitor for suspicious traffic patterns and behavioral anomalies. Not only does this increase security, but it also reduces vulnerabilities to improve overall posture across the digital enterprise.

What’s not to like with Cisco DNA Center’s advanced persistent threat detection, day-zero malware discovery, and encryption capabilities? Multilayered machine learning combined with the power of ISE and Stealthwatch ensures complete network coverage for trusted access control everywhere.

8. Cutting Costs

Cisco DNA Center is the perfect solution for businesses to reach their highest potential – providing streamlined operations and cost reductions through automation, and . This powerful tool enables companies to optimize performance, complexity, threats, and labor costs to save money each day and maximize efficiency.

Conclusion

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that we must be prepared for unexpected disruptions to our networks. To stay ahead of the curve, it is essential to develop strong business resilience and prioritize new network capabilities enabled by automation and AI insights from platforms like Cisco DNA Center. If you would like assistance in managing your network, contact WEI anytime and we can get started.

Next Steps: You can learn more about how Cisco can transform your network into an intention-based unified fabric that not only furthers the scalability, agility, and performance of your network, but your business objectives as well. Take a closer look at this stunning tool in our white paper, .

The post 8 Reasons Why Cisco DNA Center Is The Future Of Network Management appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Back in 2016, Georgia State University decided to address the annual phenomenon known as “summer melt” in which a sizable number of students enrolled during the summer session would fail to enroll in the fall. The school implemented a chatbot project called that was designed to regularly connect with incoming students. This practice, commonly referred to as nudge technology by reminds students of upcoming meetings and deadlines. Additionally, and in the interest of this blog article, nudge technology also uses AI to answer frequently asked questions that incoming students often have.

In its first four months, Pounce exchanged nearly 200,000 messages with students, a volume of work that equates to 10 full-time workers. Later, Pounce began monitoring student records to identify potential opportunities or issues that may impact their scholastic journey or educational performance. The project proved a resounding success as the dreaded summer melt was reduced by 21 percent. As an added bonus, first-generation students receiving the messages earned final grades about 11 points higher than their peers.

Colleges Competing For Fewer Students

According to the , four million fewer Americans in 2022 enrolled in college compared to 2012. Colleges are also losing too many students who have already started their academic journey. A showed that 32.9% of undergraduates fail to complete their degree program. But initiatives such as Pounce are working to reverse this trend, ensuring that students remain in school and earn their degree.

Students Value Technology-Driven Colleges

While technology can be used to effectively retain existing students, it can also be a great way to recruit new students. The desire for a personalized experience is as strong as ever. Two-year students enrolled in the 2021 fall semester

• 70% wanted more online courses.
• 57% desired hybrid course options.
• 63% wanted more digital materials and digital resources utilized in their courses.
• 59% wanted more technology for fully in-person courses.

Students Desire More Integrated Technology Options

Students want more than just digital curriculum resources. According to the 2021 Juniper Remote Workplace and Public Spaces Consumer Survey, 95% of surveyed consumers said they’d prefer to attend schools and public places that offer connected experiences over places that do not. In the Juniper Networks study, student age adults were asked about what digital experiences they valued:

• 40-45% were more likely to go congregate in public places that offer new wireless conveniences using their mobile devices.
• 45% much preferred the ability to automatically check-in without stopping at a check-in desk.
• 41% highly valued the ability to use contactless payment services at the register.

Whether its booking a computer in the library, getting a cup of coffee at the campus barista, or streaming a favorite movie in their dorm room, college students expect a seamless digital experience that stems from prior engagements with digital giants such as Meta, Netflix, and Google Maps.

How Juniper Networks Helps Higher Educational Institutions

To seamlessly connect your entire college campus and ensure that students benefit from the digital experience, a high-caliber IT network is required. To achieve this, many colleges and universities are turning to Juniper Network’s location-enabled network solutions that utilize intelligent automation for easy management and greater resilience. Recent examples include the following:

• The is the #15 top public university in the country according to S. News and World Report’s America’s Best Colleges. The school turned to Juniper to architect an ultra-fast agile network that would efficiently meet the exponential bandwidth needs of its campus. Juniper gave them the ability to automate routing configurations and validation tasks that improved reliability and network performance.
• The wanted to augment their network to achieve their new directives and business objectives. Juniper delivered a tenfold increase in network capacity that gave them the agility to move workloads between their on-prem location and the cloud. Juniper also delivered Wi-Fi infrastructure that blanketed their entire campus including high traffic public spaces.
• The was saddled with a legacy layer 2 network that was unreliable and was no longer able to support their expanding academic programs. Juniper refreshed its connectivity for all 35 campus buildings as well as its data center without interruption while also simplifying their network management processes.

Juniper has dedicated a lot of resources to learning about the challenges of higher educational institutions and provide solutions to overcome them. These solutions include SND-enabled universal routing platforms and low latency 100Gbe switches that feature modular designs and automation.

These solutions are also backed by Marvis, the Juniper virtual assistant that utilizes natural language processing along with natural language understanding that allow it to communicate and empower human IT support teams. Juniper has the technology, the innovation, and the understanding of high education to help your organization meet the stringent demands of students and customers alike now, and into the future.

Next Steps: This white paper by WEI identifies how Juniper Networks’ location-based networking helps higher education institutes overcome complex technology challenges. Readers will better identify:

• Concerns of higher education IT professionals
• Why network infrastructure is a differentiator
• Challenge of improving remote experiences
• Value of a virtual network assistant

The post Why Higher Education Turns to Technology to Meet Today’s Challenges appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Hybrid work is quickly becoming the predominant model for many organizations. Its popularity stems from the fact people can work from home, the office, or anywhere else. Approximately of employees in the U.S. prefer a hybrid work environment compared to fully remote or fully on-site. This creates the essential need for office networks to accommodate increased bandwidth and other adaptations. In this article, we cover the importance of a flexible wireless architecture and five strategies to help enterprises meet their needs with hybrid workforce solutions.

Why A Flexible Wireless Architecture Is Important

Flexibility is a relative term when it comes to wireless architecture. Having easy and efficient scalability is necessary to deal with unexpected increases in network traffic along with demands for new services. A flexible wireless architecture is also vital for Wi-Fi security. Your network should be able to support newer technologies like Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 6E, along with security frameworks such as zero trust, SASE, and network segmentation.

Flexible wireless networks can help organizations meet unexpected performance demands. As employees work online and switch from their laptops to their tablets or mobile devices, a flexible wireless architecture helps with the transportation of media from both on-premises and cloud environments. Here are five strategies that can help companies achieve these benefits and adapt their Wi-Fi networks to handle the constant change in hybrid work technologies.

1. Ensure a consistent and secure experience for a hybrid workforce.

Hybrid workers need consistent network performance and user experience to be able to work efficiently from any location. Wireless network security is also an extremely important aspect of hybrid workforce solutions. It should not only match the measures of protection that employees would have in the office, but your system should be able to secure personal data and cloud services across remote Wi-Fi networks.

Luckily, there are improved remote work solutions specifically designed to enhance user experience for a hybrid workforce. According to , “The ESG study found that 44% of enterprises have worked to deliver corporate Wi-Fi to home offices as a direct result of the pandemic.”

2. Adopt unified cloud-based management solutions.

Over 90% of enterprises have adopted at least one cloud-based application to deliver business services. Naturally, cloud-based network management solutions are the ideal architecture for almost any company. A flexible wireless architecture engineered for cloud-based network management has many benefits including:

• Efficiency in operations.
• Allowing remote IT staff to access a centralized cloud management portal.
• End-to-end management of multiple locations such as the office, home, and branch locations.
• Consolidating and anonymizing data sources to increase the speed of AI and machine learning integration.

3. Refresh, upgrade, or modernize campus Wi-Fi networks to address accumulated technical debt.

The pandemic brought a new surge in demand for Wi-Fi networks. It became necessary to innovate hybrid workforce solutions, such as making sure networks can accommodate heavy video and voice traffic without affecting network performance, scalability, security, and manageability.

It is recommended organizations upgrade their infrastructure to Wi-Fi 6 and 6E. This upgrade can deliver greater bandwidth that can help your network support IoT and edge computing solutions.

4. Implement a smart recommendations engine.

Distributed environments have made the job of manually resolving network issues exceedingly complex. Integrating artificial intelligence and machine learning with hybrid workforce solutions is necessary for optimized network performance and quicker problem resolutions, especially in an always-on environment.

5. Extend security models from campus to remote work.

When organizations have such a highly distributed environment, a larger attack surface is created. Having consistent and tightly incorporated security across all Wi-Fi environments, including on campus or in the homes of employees, should be a top priority for enterprises with a hybrid workforce. Instead of hiring new security professionals, organizations should deploy integrated capabilities to their Wi-Fi networks to support zero trust and SASE environments.

Hybrid Workforce Solutions

Many hybrid workforce solutions can truly enhance a flexible wireless architecture such as HPE . This innovative cloud-native architecture provides automated network management, edge-to-cloud security, and AI-powered insights necessary for hybrid workspaces.

To cope with the massive amounts of data businesses acquire, it’s clear that today’s network architecture needs to be flexible to accommodate AI-powered and predictive tools. HPE Aruba Networking’s ESP is highly scalable and can help accomplish those needs as well as improve business agility and optimization. This platform can identify and fix problems at the network edge before they impact devices or applications. It is also an ideal solution for those working from multiple locations. With ESP, IT teams can see what is connected to the network no matter where they are working, ultimately giving enterprises the ability to do cloud-managed networking at a large scale.

Hybrid work will continue to evolve, and hybrid workforce solutions like HPE Aruba Networking’s ESP can provide more flexibility and freedom for people to work more efficiently from anywhere. To learn more about ESP and what a flexible wireless architecture can do for your organization, contact WEI today.

Next Steps: See why enterprises are catching on to the latest “as-a-Service” trend in our fresh whitepaper titled,

The post Top Five Strategies To Build A Flexible Wireless Architecture appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

When we talk about upgrading wireless infrastructure to the latest Wi-Fi 6E standard, it is instinctive to focus on client computing devices and smart phones. That’s because organizations want to optimize the user wireless experience for their employees and customers, and understandably so. However, for a growing number of enterprises, there’s another critical component to their wireless environment: IoT (Internet of things!). Organizations are integrating a growing fleet of IoT devices to take advantage of cutting-edge technologies. In 2022 alone, the to 14.4 billion active devices. If you’re only looking at optimizing the wireless experience for users, do not ignore IoT’s half of the equation!

Wi-Fi 6E Offers IoT Exclusivity

A primary benefit of Wi-Fi 6E is the exclusive access it provides to the newly approved 6 GHz bandwidth frequency. It has four times the bandwidth capacity of 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz and supplies 1,200 MHz of extra spectrum. In all, this nearly doubles the amount of delivered throughput to clients that support the new wireless standard. It’s not just the increased bandwidth that Wi-Fi 6E provides, however. It is the ability to separate your most critical user and IoT workloads so they don’t have to compete with noisy legacy wireless devices.

Imagine for a moment all the IoT enabled technology solutions that are parachuting into the healthcare industry. Already, the average hospital utilizes 10 to 15 medical devices for each patient. That constitutes as many as 350,000 devices per hospital and we have barely witnessed the tip of the iceberg. Eventually, longtime surgeons will use augmented reality to rehearse complex surgeries and systems will monitor critically ill patients. These are clearly the types of systems you will want operating within one exclusive frequency.

Of course, it works both ways too. Many legacy and current IoT devices don’t require a great deal of bandwidth to function. This makes them ideal candidates to remain within the 2.4 GHz band, completely separated from Wi-Fi 6E enabled user devices and critical sensory devices. All of this is no problem for Juniper Wi-Fi 6E access points such as the and routers. These tri-band access points support 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz, and 6 GHz so they can handle the newest wireless stations on the market, while ensuring backwards compatibility with older devices that still serve their purpose.

The Need for Battery Life Extension

According to an EU funded study, 78 million batteries that power IoT devices will be dumped every day throughout the world by 2025 if nothing is done to improve a battery’s lifespan. Many IoT devices rely on batteries. Not only is a diminished battery life bad for the environment, but it also proves expensive to constantly replace them. The Wi-Fi 6E standard is helping aid this issue with its Target Wake Time (TWT) feature that reduces power consumption by empowering access points and wireless stations to negotiate their wake-up times to receive and send data. This not only saves power and promotes extended battery life, but it also reduces network congestion and prevents scheduled overlap in highly concentrated station environments.

Juniper IoT Assurance

While there are multiple companies today that provide Wi-Fi 6E solutions, only Juniper offers Mist IoT Assurance. Juniper Mist IoT Assurance is a cloud-based service that makes it easy for IoT devices to connect using a Multiple Pre-Shared Key (MPSK) mechanism in a secure fashion. Managing and securing the connection process for IoT devices has always proved challenging since the bulk of these devices are headless, meaning that they lack a GUI interface and operate without a keyboard or mouse. This hinders the ability to onboard, segment and manage IoT device credentials at scale. Juniper is changing all of that.

Unlike traditional solutions, its onboarding process doesn’t rely on MAC addresses. This makes it ideal for devices that utilize client MAC randomization. With its automatic PSK expiration that works in conjunction with automatic key rotation, organizations can now keep PSKs regularly rotated without the risk of service disruption regardless of deployment scale. Juniper IoT Assurance is 100% API programmable so you can easily integrate it with your preferred mobile device management solution to further streamline the provisioning processes for your fleet of IoT devices. Other features include location management and the ability to assign traffic policies based on PSK identity.

Soon, Juniper is expected to include built-in tools that will give customers the ability to create custom self-provisioning PSK portals that automatically generates PSKs according to user identity. Automatic client device provisioning will also be further simplified with QR codes or automatic Wi-Fi connection URLs without the need to install anything.

And Let’s Not Forget Marvis

Like other Juniper Mist solutions, your IT team can use natural language queries to communicate with Marvis. Marvis is a virtual network assistant that can perform help desk functionality at your verbal command. Marvis is always there working for you to determine the root cause of plaguing problems and perform automated remediation to solve them. It’s one more example of how Juniper is simplifying the management process of highly scaled IoT environments.

Conclusion

Wireless isn’t just about servicing user devices. Today, you need a wireless solution that provides equal functionality for IoT devices as well. Similarly, if you’re contemplating upgrading your wireless infrastructure to Wi-Fi 6, you’re missing out on the full set of capabilities available today with Wi-Fi 6E. Juniper and Wi-Fi 6E together is the complete solution to maximize your wireless enterprise.

Next Steps: Download our new white paper, to discover what critical capabilities your wireless network infrastructure is currently missing. This is information that every network administrator should read!

The post Level Up On IoT With Wi-Fi 6E appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

The number of remote workers rose dramatically during the pandemic and has steadily increased since. In fact, report more than half of their workforce works remotely at least two days a week. This changes the way enterprises utilize their networks to best support users and devices connected from remote locations. Networks play a critical role in helping companies communicate and connect. This is why IT teams are changing the way they think about networking to help embrace the constant changes in security and performance. IT departments can ensure employee experience is simple and consistent with advanced remote workforce solutions.

The Challenges Of Remote Work

A majority of companies had to make an unplanned and quick transition to allow their workforce to operate from home. Only miniscule of employees worked from home before the pandemic and almost three-quarters never worked remotely. Now that remote workers have increased unexpectedly, many organizations are experiencing a rise in cyberattacks due to a dispersed workforce that creates system and network vulnerabilities. In turn, this shift has created network architecture and support for IT teams.

Organizations are also at an increased risk because workers require secure access to data from anywhere using cloud applications. Employee productivity also depends on the ability to stay secure, the quality of network speed, and the reliability of their network connections. This is why new remote workforce solutions, such as EdgeConnect Microbranchfrom HPE Aruba Networking, are evolving to combine enterprise-grade wireless solutions with SD-WAN (software-defined wide area network). SD-WAN improves the performance and user experience in branches and on campuses and now it can do the same for the remote workforce.

SD-WAN Solutions For Home Workers

To address the challenges enterprises face while they implement and expand remote work, HPE Aruba Networking has introduced EdgeConnect Microbranch. It has been designed to simplify the complexity of remote work networking for businesses. This solution has also enhanced security and unified management to meet the critical needs of any business.

HPE Aruba Networkingexplains, “IT can remotely deploy and centrally manage secure network connectivity for hundreds or even thousands of remote workers or small office employees to deliver an in-office experience using HPE Aruba Networking Central and any HPE Aruba Networking access point – without need for a gateway.” This advanced remote network solution has added SD-WAN capabilities that help deliver better-performing connectivity from the edge to the data center to the cloud. EdgeConnect Microbranch has been offered as part of HPE Aruba Networking’s new bundle called Edge Services Platform (ESP), which helps provide a remote office experience through remote access points (RAPs).

These SD-WAN capabilities include policy-based routing, tunnel and route orchestration, SASE (secure access service edge) integration, and enhanced WAN visibility. These added functions are designed to allow companies to mimic and offer an extensive range of in-office and campus connectivity services to remote workers with no gateway or new hardware required. This facilitates the objective of increasing productivity and security.

The Benefits Of EdgeConnect Microbranch

HPE Aruba Networking’s Edgeconnect Microbranch improves remote workforce solutions with its new SD-WAN features. Here are some noteworthy benefits:

• Cloud-managed Wi-Fi: Any HPE Aruba Networking Access Point (AP) can be used to provide dependable, high-performing connectivity to offer the same experience and security whether employees are at home or in the office.
• Intelligence policy-based routing: This automates how traffic should be routed to endpoints based on rules for specific applications to enhance performance and security.
• Automated route and tunnel orchestration: APs can organize VPN tunnels on demand and reroute traffic as needed.
• SASE and Zero Trust: This applies policy-based routing to orchestrate tunnels and direct certain remote user traffic for cloud security inspection to extend SASE and Zero Trust architecture to home offices.
• WAN health troubleshooting: Dashboard views provide near real-time updates on WAN availability and utilization that can help accelerate problem resolution.
• Access to in-office resources: Workers can plug VoIP phones or wired printers directly into the AP to have secure access to on-campus resources using corporate SSIDs.

Conclusion

Overall, new remote workforce solutions such as EdgeConnect Microbranch can better support remote work. These solutions also help IT ensure secure and reliable access for remote workforces by extending WAN and providing employees with an efficient in-office experience.

IT teams can also manage environments with more ease with cloud-based network management and Zero Touch Provisioning. This helps IT monitor remote locations and troubleshoot issues in real-time while overseeing network utilization, latency, and other connectivity issues.

If you are one of many businesses that have adopted remote or hybrid work, contact WEI today to learn more about remote workforce solutions to enhance home office environments.

NEXT STEPS: SD-WAN is ideal for campus-based networks or distributed enterprises, or any enterprise with remote/branch offices. Explore the top three benefits of SD-WAN in our short video below.

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We’ve been talking a lot about Wi-Fi 6E this spring and summer season even though it was formally introduced by the Wi-Fi Alliance way back in January 2021. So, why all the attention now? There are a lot of groundbreaking aspects of this exciting new technology as Wi-Fi 6E allows for more devices to connect at greater speeds than any of its predecessors. However, it is only now that devices are rolling off the assembly line with Wi-Fi 6E capability. The urgency to upgrade to this new protocol will only grow for enterprises as time goes by.

Still, we must not forget the wireless elephant in the room: Better performance and faster speeds do not amount to much of anything unless your enterprise’s wireless sessions are properly secured. The security threshold of today should always be a determining factor when considering the new technology of tomorrow, especially for wireless environments.

Wi-Fi 6E Is Mandated for WPA3

If your wireless infrastructure primarily relies on Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2) as its wireless security protocol, then your system remains vulnerable to attacks that have been present for nearly two decades. That’s because WPA2 dates back to 2004 – the same year the Boston Red Sox broke their 86-year World Series curse. They have since won three more World Series titles, three different US presidents have taken office, and the iPod is far from removed as the most popular personal electronic device. A lot has happened since 2004, and it was good to see Twinkies make a comeback”¦

While Wi-Fi 5, also known as 802.11ac, does include WPA3 as an option, it isn’t enforced, so client devices can revert to the less secure protocol. This isn’t the case with Wi-Fi 6E. The Wi-Fi Alliance mandates the use of WPA3 for Wi-Fi 6E devices that operate in the 6 GHz band. In other words, if you want to experience the expanded boundaries of wireless network performance, you must abide by the increased security parameters.

Why WPA3 Is More Secure

For those that utilize pre-shared keys (PSK) for access authentication, WPA3 removes the ability for hackers to connect to your network using dictionary attacks. This has always been a weak point for WPA and WPA2 as hackers throw thousands of passwords from a list until they get one to hit. Of course, one could always create a 63-character length key consisting solely of gibberish, but let’s face it – how many IT administrators actually do that?

WPA3 replaces PSK authentication with something called Simultaneous Authentication of Equals (SAE). While SAE still uses a passphrase, it isn’t sent between Wi-Fi devices during the SAE exchange. It also commits a device to one password guess for each authentication cycle by utilizing a new authentication handshake mechanism. This prevents an attacker from cycling through an endless password list in quick succession, making brute force attacks nearly irrelevant. While we do not recommend using “password123” or “qwerty” as your passphrase, WPA3 does help relieve the pressure of creating that perfect password.

For those organizations that currently use WPA2-Enterprise, WPA3 gives organizations the option of extending the length of the encryption key from 128 bits to 192 bits. It also requires the use of Protected Management Frames (PMF) that protects traffic from being eaves dropped and forged.

Open Access Now Means Encrypted Access

Providing wireless access to guest end users and the general public has always been tricky. Still, it is an expectation of the end user whenever visiting a business for a sales presentation or performing work in a cafe that requires internet access. Requiring PSK access requires some way to convey the passphrase to those who need it, while providing the convenience of wide-open access introduces austere security issues. Open wireless sessions are especially vulnerable to man-in-the-middle attacks in which an attacker intercepts the four-way handshake process of the unencrypted connection to lure users to connect a rogue wireless connection. The attacker can then intercept packets that traverse through their device. Wi-Fi 6E prevents this from happening by replacing open authentication with what’s called Opportunistic Wireless Encryption (OWE). OWE merges convenience and security together because all sessions are encrypted with a secret key, regardless of whether access authentication is required or not. In similar fashion to WPA3, OWE support is mandatory for any devices operating within the 6 GHz band.

These Security Features Are Available In Wi-Fi 6…Right?

Almost. Wi-Fi 6E is a technical extension of the Wi-Fi 6 standard that was released in 2019, and yes, WPA3, SAE, OWE and PMF are each available in Wi-Fi 6. However, there is one big thing that isn’t – the 6 GHz frequency band. Not only does the 6 GHz band offer enhanced capacity and throughput, but it also gives an exclusive pipe that Wi-Fi 6E clients can operate in. This means no interference from noisy legacy devices that also rely on legacy security protocols. Because the mentioned security enhancements are mandated with this private frequency band, organizations that work toward a full integration of Wi-Fi 6E are ensured greater security across their entire wireless spectrum. Hands down, mandated security is preferable to optional security.

Backwards Compatibility

Juniper Networks has embraced this new high caliber wireless standard and currently offers two solutions to get you closer to greater security and speed. The Juniper and Juniper are tri-band access points that support not only the 6 GHz frequency, but the 2.4 GHz and 5GHz as well. This makes them backwards compatible so that you can accommodate your current legacy wireless devices while you work to work to upgrade your fleet of devices.

Conclusion

Upgrading to Wi-Fi 6 from Wi-Fi 5 is only a half-step upgrade. With Wi-Fi 6E, you get enhanced security and high performance in one package. Wi-Fi 6E is the complete experience, and with backwards compatibility built into the Juniper infrastructure, there’s no reason not to take advantage of everything that Wi-Fi 6E has to offer.

Next Steps: Download our new white paper, to discover what critical capabilities your wireless network infrastructure is currently missing. This is information that every network administrator should read!

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Learn why making a wireless network upgrade to Wi-Fi 6E may not be as complex as you might think. Read more.

The latest protocol for improving your wireless network performance is beginning to make itself available to new devices here in 2022, and its name is Wi-Fi 6E. Chances are, your network management team may be unacquainted with this new innovative standard as very few client devices currently support it. This unfamiliarity won’t be for long, however. Wi-Fi 6E has too many advantages over its predecessors to be ignored. It is destined to empower a whole new generation of wireless and IoT devices to experience faster speed, lower latency, high capacity, and greater security. It might be the biggest wireless network event that you haven’t heard of.

A New IEEE Wireless Naming Convention

If you are new to Wi-Fi 6E, there’s a good chance you are not accustomed to the new wireless naming convention, compliments of the world’s largest technical professional organization for the advancement of technology – For instance, many organizations are on 802.11ac protocol. So, how does that relate to Wi-Fi 6E? To alleviate the burden of remembering all those different letters such as a, b, g, n, ac, and ax, IEEE formally implemented a new naming system that is much easier to recognize, hence the Wi-Fi 5, Wi-Fi 6, and Wi-Fi 6E naming conventions. This new practice makes it easy to discern the order in which they were released:

Make Major Wireless Network Performance Gains With Wi-Fi 6E

The days of handicapping wireless computing experiences is over with Wi-Fi 6E. While users at one time accepted inferior speed and performance as the cost of using wireless versus the steadfast operation of an ethernet-connected desktop, those reduced expectations belong to a forgone era. Modern users expect uninterrupted performance, and that is regardless of how they are connected to the network. Wi-Fi 6E is designed to meet these lofty expectations.

In our handy chart above, you will notice that Wi-Fi 6E is the only wireless standard that supports the 6 GHz frequency band, which gives its supported devices their own exclusive area to operate. This means that new wireless devices don’t have to compete with older and slower legacy devices. If it’s easier, you can think of Wi-Fi 6E as the private express lane on a congested interstate. These express lanes are often optional toll lanes that run alongside highly congested traffic corridors to provide an optimal commuting experience for those willing to pay with an electronic pass. Wi-Fi 6E has an express lane, too, and its version of an electronic pass is that the wireless network devices and wireless infrastructure are to each support this newest standard. By separating from the slower moving traffic, new devices that support Wi-Fi 6E protocol can attain their own exclusive connections.

Improve Your Wireless Network Performance With More Bandwidth

For many enterprises that still rely on older Wi-Fi 5 technology, it is empowering to see why Wi-Fi 6E is better suited to support today’s congested wireless networks. For one, Wi-Fi- 6E’s 6 GHz band has four times the capacity of the traditional 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands, so it can best accommodate high-volume workloads such as teleconferencing and streaming technologies. The 6 GHz express lane supports seven super wide 160 MHz channels. That’s 12 more than 5 GHz, which is why Wi-Fi 6E can easily serve augmented reality gaming experiences. In the end, Wi-Fi 6e enables multi-gigabit low latency connection for the modern world. And in those rare occasions when you need a little more physical reach to connect your Wi-Fi 6E device, it can always use the 2.4 GHz band to do so. This means greater resiliency for your wireless environment.

Juniper Networks Support For Wi-Fi 6E

While few client devices currently support this new exclusive standard, there’s no doubt that Wi-Fi 6E is the future. With the speed at which innovation is released and adapted today, it’s imperative to ensure that all aspects of your enterprise are future-proof. That includes your wireless infrastructure. Juniper Networks is embracing this exciting new standard that undoubtedly resets the bar for wireless speed and performance. The network company just recently introduced two tri-band access points to the marketplace: and These routers both support secure client-to-cloud automation by connecting to the Juniper Mist network upon startup to download assigned configurations and firmware updates. This dramatically speeds up deployment time, creating an optimal experience for the managing operator as well.

Future-Proof Wireless Network Performance With Wi-Fi 6E

If you are contemplating upgrading your wireless infrastructure to the former Wi-Fi 6E standard that is already three years old, get in the express lane and pass ahead to the next generation of wireless, Wi-Fi 6E. This new standard will not only power the overabundance of end user computing devices that continue to be introduced to your network, but also the plethora of IoT devices that are being implemented to support your key business services. It’s a new world and one that requires a new wireless standard. Contact WEI to learn more about how Wi-Fi 6E can help revolutionize your business.

Next Steps: Download our new white paper, to discover what critical capabilities your wireless network infrastructure is currently missing. This is information that every network administrator should have!

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Digital transformation initiatives have fallen well within the realm of the traditional wide-area network (WAN). Complications with emerging market trends, shifting consumer demands, and increased competition are primary reasons why one enterprise after another has made the jump to software-defined WAN (SD-WAN). And for those that haven’t, well, they most likely (or should) have this on their list of IT investment objectives. If not, there will be compromised business-critical services and network performance.

Transition to SD-WAN Must Include Security

We know that SD-WAN is a viable solution to reduce overhead and support the new applications and services that result from digital transformation. As an IT leader, however, you must also ask this question: Does my SD-WAN strategy feature robust capabilities, especially with built-in security? This goes a long way to ensuring a high-performing distributed network.

Direct connections to cloud and internet resources bypass the antiquated hub-and-spoke security features often seen in traditional network architecture. This exposure, as a result, requires strong security that many SD-WAN networking solutions do not offer, unfortunately. Consistent protection will eliminate security and performance tradeoffs, thus leading to less headaches for IT leaders. Here’s a quick rundown of what robust built-in security features can achieve:

• Critical Application Prioritization: Most SD-WAN solutions cannot support a large number of application signatures or application performance optimization. Ultimately, this creates a poor end user experience.
• Reduced Attack Surface: As great as SD-WAN is, it is still a connectivity offering that enables open season for threats to attack the network. Advanced security solutions must be embedded into each SD-WAN device so all networking, connectivity and security items all function as a single solution. 
• Comprehensive Analytics and Reporting: Total visibility of your network and application performance is a must! Improve end user experience with real-time analytics that help businesses identify networking and security policies that require fine-tuning. 

Five ways SD-WAN can boost the bottom line

Here are five different ways the experts at Fortinet have identified that SD-WAN can boost your bottom line and save IT headaches.

1. SD-WAN improves performance

Not all network traffic is created equally. SD-WAN can be configured to prioritize business-critical traffic and real-time services and steer it over the most efficient route. By facilitating critical applications through these connections, IT teams can help reduce packet loss and latency issues – improving employee productivity and boosting morale.

2. SD-WAN boosts security

Digital transformation is a double-edged sword. While it can improve customer satisfaction and extend market reach, it can also expose an organization to significant security risks. The good news is SD-WAN solutions offer built-in security features such as NGFW, IPS, encryption, AV, and sandboxing capabilities that help prevent data loss, downtime, regulatory violations, and legal liabilities.

3. SD-WAN lowers complexity

Digital transformation initiatives can add layers of complexity to a network. The result is not only a risk of poor network performance, but over-taxed IT teams and the need for locating onsite personnel at remote sites to manage the local IT infrastructure. Fortunately, SD-WAN can ease IT’s burden by simplifying WAN infrastructure – using broadband to offload non-critical business apps, automating monitoring tasks, and managing traffic through a centralized controller.

4. SD-WAN enables cloud usage

Organizations are increasingly adopting cloud services. SD-WAN enables direct cloud access at the remote branch, eliminating backhauling traffic and allowing users to directly access cloud applications regardless of location without burdening the core network with additional traffic to manage and secure. Additionally, SD-WAN improves cloud application performance by prioritizing business critical applications and enabling branches to directly communicate via internet.

5. SD-WAN reduces costs

As enterprises deploy an ever-increasing array of cloud-based applications, the amount of data traveling over a WAN increases exponentially, which increases operating costs. Fortunately, SD-WAN can reduce this price tag by leveraging low cost local internet access, providing direct cloud access, and reducing the amount of traffic over the backbone WAN. According to an , nearly a quarter of respondents expect SD-WAN cost savings of upwards of 39 percent.

Talk with WEI about Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution

As the SD-WAN market continues to grow and organizations transition to a modernized WAN infrastructure, it’s more important than ever that organizations remain aware of the importance of security. Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution is the first to fully integrate security and networking – including routing, SD-WAN, a full security suite, WAN optimization, and integrated management – into a single SD-WAN solution designed to meet the actual demands of the growing WAN Edge market. Contact WEI today to learn more about Fortinet’s solution, and how your enterprise can benefit.

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The rise of cloud-based computing coincides with the increase of as-a-service models. Many companies realize that transitioning to this business model offers significant opportunities for business development, growth, and financial transparency. Enterprises adding new technologies to IT infrastructure can stretch existing networks beyond capacity. This is why many companies are finding that Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) is exactly what they need to fulfill their business objectives. In this article, we discuss the basics of NaaS, its benefits, and why these advantages can help with the costliness and complexity of managing multiple networks within your organization.

The Basics Of NaaS

Before we get into the benefits of NaaS, let’s briefly review what this cloud service model entails. explains, “NaaS allows customers to operate their own networks without maintaining their own networking infrastructure. Like other cloud services, NaaS vendors run networking functions using software, essentially allowing companies to set up their own networks entirely without hardware. All they need is Internet connectivity.” This emerging model can give organizations much-needed flexibility. Instead of buying and installing rigid network hardware that eventually ages, businesses can pay a monthly subscription for network services.

Essentially, those who use NaaS can more easily move network infrastructure to the cloud allowing users to operate their own networks without maintaining their own networking infrastructure. The NaaS model can bring countless benefits to organizations of all sizes and the Networking solution can be an incredibly helpful resource.

The Benefits Of NaaS

NaaS simplifies management of technologies and is cheaper to operate than traditional network infrastructure. It can provide organizations with the flexibility and agility needed by keeping up with the rapid and constant changes in IT. As HPE GreenLake for Networking points out, “To put this in context, the last 8 years has seen us jump from Wi-Fi 5 through Wi-Fi 6 and now into Wi-Fi 6E. Technology iterates quickly, as do business requirements.” NaaS can help your enterprise stay ahead of the curve.

No matter what size of office you run, NaaS offers scalable solutions to support any business from federal agencies, healthcare sectors, education, and much more. HPE GreenLake for Networking provides all of these advantages and then some. A few examples include:

1. Lower Cost

Considering that we are in a post-pandemic era where enterprises expect more and more out of a limited IT budget, this particular benefit could be the biggest of all. NaaS reduces numerous IT costs including infrastructure, hardware, software and operations. This service also offers flexibility with monthly subscriptions instead of being charged large networking costs all at once, allowing for a more predictable budget. This consumption model allows for better transparency when balancing your annual budget.

2. Optimizes Performance

Optimization is a common challenge for organizations that are looking to digitally transform. NaaS can ensure your network operates efficiently by determining how capable it is of supporting the amount of traffic you are getting. Your provider can then make any necessary adjustments.

3. Proactive Network Management

Many organizations practice a reactive maintenance strategy. This can lead to unexpected downtime, especially when dealing with the network demands of modern enterprises. Instead of having your IT team spend a significant amount of time on troubleshooting the network, NaaS solutions can and will predict network issues early on with proactive monitoring. In regards to HPE GreenLake for Networking, a reports, “Interviewed customers noted a significant decrease in time-to-market for the global IT projects after the HPE GreenLake investment.” This survey found that GreenLake customers could reduce deployment of global IT projects by 75%.

4. Improved Security

Data breaches are at an all-time high with one ransomware attack every in 2022, which is an increase of 20% compared to 2019. These attacks are a concern for businesses of every size. However, one of the many benefits of NaaS is that it helps protect sensitive data in any industry by implementing best practices for IT security. HPE GreenLake for Networking can also provide detailed insights in order to make sure your network is at optimal operating standards and free of security vulnerabilities.

Conclusion

In general, implementing Network-as-a-Service has a variety of advantages. Enterprises are moving to the cloud every day. As such, they will need to determine how their data will be networked. NaaS enables you to get the network infrastructure help your organization needs and a model you can afford. It’s a terrific way to transform your business, optimize processes, increase security, and more.

The overall benefits of increasing agility and reducing network complexity enable organizations to have optimized networks that help dynamic environments grow. Contact the networking experts at WEI to find out how you can take advantage of this as a service model for your organization.

Next Steps: Digitally transforming your company can become less challenging with HPE Aruba Networking’s flexible approach to networking. Learn more about how NaaS can take your network performance to the next level by downloading our white paper titled, “.”

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Network as a Service (NaaS) offers many advantages for network management teams such as flexibility and increased customization. It is an important way for companies to configure their network infrastructure and allows customers to operate their own networks without the clunky hardware; all that is needed is internet connectivity. As the technology world continues its shift in the “as a service” era, this standardized NaaS offering that HPE GreenLake for Networking makes possible should come as no surprise in GreenLake’s latest expansion. It is the first standardized version of NaaS, a breakthrough for seamless cloud services. In this article we review the benefits of NaaS, the eight new enterprise NaaS offerings from HPE GreenLake for Networking, and how they can improve network application and performance management.

The Advantages Of NaaS

This spring’s groundbreaking release of the GreenLake cloud service comes at an ideal time with NaaS adoption on the rise. According to the 2022 IDC NaaS Survey, 37% of organizations across the globe have already deployed NaaS for cloud or edge use cases, and another 40% plan to deploy NaaS within the next 24 months. Given its many advantages, it’s no surprise that a large number of enterprises are utilizing NaaS. Cloud services like HPE GreenLake offer more flexibility and greater customization since changes are made to the network via software and not hardware, ultimately giving enterprises the ability to manage multiple networking domains. Additionally, NaaS makes it possible for providers to offer both networking and security services, creating a more secure network infrastructure.

Another advantage of NaaS is the improved quality of service. With enhanced network management, customers can focus on the quality of their work without being hindered by IT issues. The right NaaS partner will help you optimize your network streams, ensuring your data is getting to the cloud correctly.

NaaS is exactly what businesses need to fulfill their objectives and grow. Not only does it offer more flexibility and security, but it also reduces many IT costs. The right NaaS partner can make their digital transformation process as smooth as possible, minimizing expenses as you implement new processes and equipment. Another way costs can be reduced is through a recurring subscription-based fee that HPE GreenLake offers. You can learn more about the benefits of HPE GreenLake for Networking by reading our article that lists the six essential reasons companies should consider this type of cloud service.

Eight New NaaS Offerings From HPE GreenLake for Networking And Their Benefits

With the announcement of eight new standardized offerings from HPE GreenLake for Networking package is one of the most innovative edge to cloud platforms on the market today. The offerings are:

1. Indoor Wireless as a Service
2. Outdoor Wireless as a Service
3. Remote Wireless as a Service
4. Wired Access as a Service
5. Wired Aggregation as a Service
6. Wired Core as a Service
7. SD-Branch as a Service
8. HPE Aruba Networking User Experience Insight (UXI)

These eight new NaaS offerings are essentially bundled packages that will enable partners to design and deliver service packages straight to the customers, allowing them to build around whichever service is needed with subscription models. This is essential for those who are looking for a networking solution aligned with their need for a flexible and dynamic network. Maintaining a network is a substantial investment for a company, so one of the biggest advantages of this opportunity is flexibility.

The new services also help improve customer satisfaction since there is a growing demand for NaaS. These offerings provide unprecedented levels of flexibility and speed, leading to an accelerated time to revenue.

The HPE GreenLake services simplify the process of obtaining and implementing NaaS and allow customers to align network spend to usage needs while also ensuring the network is ready to support business objectives. When businesses apply these offerings, they will be able to ensure their network is always ready to support business goals that need to quickly adapt.

Most organizations certainly saw the need for flexibility when COVID-19 created the urgent need to support a large number of employees working from home. The necessity to constantly adapt has driven a greater interest in service options like HPE GreenLake to help enterprises with central network management and security, which are some of the key factors of NaaS.

Implementing NaaS has a variety of advantages: cutting costs, quality of service, maximizing your performance and more. If you’re looking to better your network management, contact WEI to get started.

Next Steps: Download and read our free white paper, “.”

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