Sep 14, 2023

New Network Security Analysis Tracks SASE Pricing Strategies

We recently surveyed a mixture of carriers and MSPs, SD-WAN vendors, and pure-play security vendors about their network security offerings in order to analyze what these services are and how they are being offered.

In this analysis, we also detail the available pricing models across services.

Here's an excerpt.

WAN
Sep 12, 2023

Why Telecom Service Providers Need To Automate

In 2021 and 2022, MEF CTO Pascal Menezes joined us on TeleGeography Explains the Internet to discuss MEF's work on standardizing the enterprise network.

This season, we welcome a new face from the same team, Stan Hubbard, Principal Analyst at MEF. Stan recently authored a State of the Industry Report for MEF; I wanted to have him on to discuss his findings and see where the telecom industry is at with adopting new technologies.

WAN
Sep 5, 2023

Are These WAN Sourcing Trends Real or Just Hype?

Season 5 of TeleGeography Explains the Internet is here, and we're kicking things off with Dennis Thankachan, Co-Founder and CEO at Lightyear.

Because Dennis is uniquely positioned to see how enterprises are sourcing networks, I was excited to talk to him about some key WAN trends he has seen recently.

Aug 31, 2023

How Common SASE Products Are Being Offered

Our Cloud and WAN Research Service just unveiled a fourth WAN analysis module, and it's all about network security.

To write this analysis, we asked a mixture of carriers and MSPs, SD-WAN vendors, and pure-play security vendors to tell us about their network security offerings.

Here's a look at what these services are and how they are being offered.

Aug 24, 2023

Eight Enterprise Products, Explained

The geographic coverage of carriers’ enterprise network services varies significantly. Not every carrier connects to every city in their customers’ networks, and not all services are available everywhere.

When narrowing down the universe of potential suppliers, enterprises must first consider how their geographic requirements overlap a potential service provider’s physical network. They then must determine if the specific data services they require are enabled at each of the service providers’ PoPs.

TeleGeography's WAN Services Coverage analysis—part of our Cloud and WAN Research Serviceexamines carrier network connectivity and service availability from a geographic perspective.

Here's a snippet of that analysis, followed by some handy definitions.

Aug 22, 2023

Fiber Fever: Meet the ISPs Driving FTTH Deployment in South Africa

Earlier this month, South African ISP Vumatel announced that its fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) infrastructure now passes two million homes. One million of these homes are in traditionally underserved areas, such as townships.

This network footprint means that Vumatel now presides over a more substantial FTTH network than Telkom South Africa’s Openserve unit.

Fiber ISPs are very much on the rise in South Africa, with multiple players gaining traction with their regional rollouts.

Unusually, the majority of these operators use an open access business model, allowing dozens of smaller companies to market and resell fiber connectivity.

Today, we take a look at the main players driving fiber growth in South Africa.

Aug 17, 2023

These Two Regions Account For About 65% of the World’s Cloud Data Centers

Cloud services have become a critical component of many enterprises' data management. And how enterprises reach the cloud service providers' data centers has become an important issue.

Traditionally, the plain old internet sufficed. But there's more than one way to skin a cat.

Aug 15, 2023

Target Acquired: e& Sets Its Sights on Europe

United Arab Emirates (UAE) telco e&—formerly known as Etisalat Group—is slowly but surely building a presence in Europe.

Aug 8, 2023

How the Cost of Network Ownership Can Change Over Time, Part 2

In case you missed it, we’re looking back at some previous hypothetical network scenarios to see how the cost of network ownership can change over time.

In last week’s blog, Senior Research Manager Brianna Boudreau explored our first tiered scenario, which takes a conservative approach to integrating internet services and SD-WAN into the WAN.

If you haven’t read it yet, I encourage you to start there. Brianna’s post also provides important context about our hypothetical network and baseline dual MPLS network.

For Part 2 of this analysis, I'll map out a second, less conservative tiered approach, then switch gears to our Remote Hybrid Network.

Let’s dive in.

Aug 3, 2023

How the Cost of Network Ownership Can Change Over Time

Enterprise customers have embraced hybrid networks that employ multiple underlay technologies combined with an SD-WAN overlay. And for good reason.

Many SaaS applications and cloud services have been optimized to work over local internet connections rather than through central internet breakouts. The integration of an SD-WAN overlay addresses many of the concerns about network performance and security that come along with incorporating internet into the WAN.

And as we detailed in our recent blog series, the DIA and broadband services included in these hybrid networks are often cheaper than MPLS–sometimes considerably so. This allows WAN managers to reduce network spend or increase their capacity while staying within the same budget.

But even after enterprise customers have undergone a network transformation, it is still imperative for them to keep tabs on the market and assess what their network should cost. Particularly if their network contract includes a benchmarking clause.

With the latest update of our enterprise port pricing, we looked back at some previous hypothetical network scenarios to see how the cost of network ownership can change over time.