Yesterday, I blogged about the “good-enough” network. You know, it’s a network that just good enough to send out a quick email or watch a video, but not quite fast or reliable enough to do everything you need.
It may be easier to think of the good-enough network in terms of other areas of your life where good enough just doesn’t cut it.
For instance, a 19-inch tube TV is certainly good enough for watching reruns of “Magnum P.I.,” but not for watching the big game.
Or using SPF 5 sunscreen may be good enough, but SPF 30 is a way better option if you want to avoid a sunburn.
Just imagine if your customers settled for a good-enough network? It may go something like this:
What are the seven myths about the good-enough network? Read More »
There are times in our lives when good enough works just fine.
For example, a 1968 Volkswagen Beetle is good enough to get you from point A to B, but not for driving on the Autobahn. (I don’t know about you, but I’d rather have a Porche 911.)
And a 19-inch tube TV is certainly good enough for watching reruns of “Magnum P.I.,” but not for watching the big game. (I’d go for a 50-inch LED HD flatscreen TV, thank you very much.)
The same goes for the network. Good enough is fine for the network if all you need to do is send a few emails or watch an occasional video.
A common discussion I hear a lot is around how to ensure application performance when accessed remotely over WAN from a centralized data center. At the same time, efficiently utilizing the limited network bandwidth available is key to customers. Cisco WAAS solution can help achieve both these objectives in a cost efficient way.
WAAS (Wide Area Application Services) is Cisco’s WAN optimization solution that helps accelerate enterprise applications delivery and data transfer in cloud. The key benefits that Cisco WAAS solution provides for enterprise applications are:
Improving end user experience for the global workforce accessing enterprise applications in private/virtual private clouds, resulting in enhanced productivity.
Improving efficiency (reduced bandwidth requirements/time) for remote replication of the enterprise application data to the DR site are
The requirement for optimizing WAN traffic becomes even more critical as customers continue to adopt data center virtualization and private/hybrid cloud to run their most demanding applications.
Deployment flexibility/options with Cisco WAAS
Cisco WAAS offers multiple deployment options (both physical and virtualized), and can easily plug into different architectures across your datacenter/private cloud, virtual private cloud at service provider, remote/branch offices, Backup/DR site, and mobile workforce. The picture below shows the different deployment options available with Cisco WAAS.
During the broadcast, he offered an overview of how services are a key differentiator for Cisco partners, and he explained how services can drive partner profitability. Here’s a replay in case you missed it.
Cisco’s services strategy places the partner at the center, according to Bob, because partners are critical to Cisco’s go-to market strategy, whether a partner is selling professional services, managed services, or technical services.
In terms of sales, it used to be that products generated far more revenue for partners than services. Five years ago, 80% of partners’ business was product-based, and 20% was generated by services. Now, partners’ business is almost split evenly between product and services. Bob then told viewers that services help an end-customer see how technology can really generate business outcomes.
Want to learn more? In addition to the video replay above, we’ve got a text summary of the broadcast, along with time stamps to identify sections in which Bob addresses key topics, such as market opportunities around architectures, success stories, and how Cisco’s services are different from those competitors offer.
With an ever growing mobile and distributed workforce, application developers are being tasked to develop applications that can also be remotely accessed by this global workforce. Application developers, with a very basic understanding of networking, assume the network has no boundaries and applications perform optimally regardless of the mode of access. At the same time, cloud computing is enabling applications to be consolidated into centralized and virtualized data centers, further increasing the distance from where the applications are being accessed. Network architects are also being challenged with current network designs for this application deployment and delivery model. The available bandwidth is being taxed as the ever growing applications portfolio competes for network resources to provide a satisfying user experience across the network without boundaries. This application delivery model also demands capabilities for better visibility and control, WAN optimization, and agility of the network to rapidly deploy and manage enterprise applications.
The Cisco Application Velocity solution addresses all the challenges associated with the delivery and consumption of enterprise applications over the network without boundaries. It is one of the five services in Cisco’s Borderless Network Architecture and is composed of innovative Cisco technologies that help IT professionals meet or exceed business SLAs, maximize user experience, optimize resource utilization, and increase reliability and user expectations.
