The SD-WAN overall concept has been implemented by vendors with different approaches and different architectures, that in the end fulfill requirements of different customer needs. For this reason Sparkle has chosen an agnostic approach in terms of SD-WAN technology, having setup a Managed SD-WAN offer and having skilled up internal resources to be able to manage various SD-WAN technology, providing at the same time Value Added Services in the whole service chain, from design, to implementation, up to operation and service management.
Sparkle have deployed various SD-WAN technologies, differentiating the deployment strategies (from full on premise, to hybrid, to full on cloud) in order to leverage, for all of them, the best architecture, reached by merging SD-WAN vendor capabilities and Sparkle global network capabilities. This approach has given Sparkle the ability to propose underlay and overlay solutions together -optimized and integrated each other- so tailoring SD-WAN on the specific underlay connectivity over which it needs to be applied. For this reason Sparkle has chosen a multi-technology approach with deployment diversity: for each customer Sparkle can choose the best SD-WAN technology, with the best deployment, that best fit the specific customer needs, in terms of network topology and business application policies.
The appropriate choice in terms of SD-WAN technology and configuration, and in terms of underlay design can help you to reduce the economic exposure of connectivity, improving the application performances at the same time. In a traditional WAN approach, customer network engineers and telco network engineers used to overestimate underlay bandwidth, to avoid or minimize the risk of bottlenecks, that could affect mission critical applications and so customer business but maximizing Customer connectivity costs as well. Sparkle, counseling the best SD-WAN technology with the best deployment and then configuring properly SD-WAN application policies over a bandwidth resized underlay, can help you to reduce underlay costs, leveraging at the same time SD-WAN ability to protect application performances, and so getting both underlay cost reduction and more performing network for your business.
Sparkle Managed SD-WAN, by leveraging a continuous mix of active/passive/hybrid monitoring measurements on underlay, has the ability to detect network impairments (packet loss, jitter, faults, i.e.) and to react to them with various remediation actions (packet duplication, packet buffering, traffic steering from an affected path to a better path, etc.), so hiding to your running applications that some problems are occuring and guaranteeing to users the best Quality of Experience.
SD-WAN is a secure overlay that is independent from underlay and can be implemented on multiple and different underlays (MPLS/Internet/hybrid), even provided by different providers. Sparkle can offer SD-WAN only on your underlay connectivity but can also be the unique interface from which you could buy both underlay (MPLS/Internet) and SD-WAN, so hiding to you the complexity in designing/implementation/execution with a single point of contact, completely engaged for the whole list of service elements and relative SLAs.
Infact Sparkle can provide SD-WAN solution fully integrated with underlay connectivity –MPLS backbone and IP Tier-1 backbone for monitored DIA/BIA Internet- or even wireless access technologies (4G/5G cellular access) that can be chosen:
- to speed up deployment time
- to diversify primary/backup connectivity paths
- to connect customer sites in hard-to-reach areas or with temporary connectivity
Sparkle is the Managed SD-WAN service provider, that can stay next to you, accompanying your journey from traditional WAN to software-defined WAN, during the whole lifecycle of your migration. Sparkle in fact can tailor a complete solution with the best mix of performances and price, offering MEF 3.0 certified Managed SD-WAN with value added services in the whole services chain, provided by Sparkle Centre of Competence that:
- Assess your needs in term of network topology and business application policies
- Choose together with you the best fitting SD-WAN technology
- Design your new underlay topology with the right composition of connectivity (MPLS, Internet, hybrid)
- Size your new underlay on the real needs of bandwidth, optimized and protected by SD-WAN
- Move to Internet your no-mission critical traffic and to MPLS your mission critical traffic
- Deliver, manage and maintain your new overlay and underlay network
Sparkle Managed SD-WAN solution is also fully integrated with the access to major cloud players (Google, Microsoft Azure, AWS, etc.). Sparkle, by leveraging its own global network (600.000 km of fiber either submarine as terrestrial) and hundreds of agreements with local operators, can design, deliver and manage any customer networks with worldwide coverage up to Hyperscalers Clouds –reached via public or private connectivity- wherever customer applications are.
Sparkle Managed SD-WAN give to you the freedom to choose to entrust your SD-WAN service provider with full management responsibility or keep in your hands the possibility to monitor or even manage your SD-WAN network, accessing it through Sparkle profiled and secure Customer Portal.
If you want to see with your eyes how Sparkle Managed SD-WAN can valorize and protect business applications traffic in a demo environment, Sparkle ha setup a demo infrastructure on virtual and dedicated capabilities, similar but separated from SD-WAN/SASE production environments, and fully integrated in Sparkle network, to show the power of Sparkle SD-WAN to potential customers during the presale phase. This infrastructure has been designed to replicate a wide range of customer network architectures and to simulate a various type of underlay impairments, that SD-WAN has the ability to detect and to which it can react, protecting application performances.
If you want to test with your hands how SD-WAN can valorize and protect your business applications traffic on your network, Sparkle can provide you with a for free Proof of Concept (PoC), assessing your needs in terms of network topology and business application policies, providing and configuring temporary edges in your sites, to allow you to monitor/manage SD-WAN deployed on your network through a PoC tenant.
