The heart of the enterprise has always been the network – and it has become more relevant than ever in today’s world of always-on connectivity.
Marcel Fouche, GM for the networking and storage business unit at Networks Unlimited, points out that the move to digitalisation is driving some major changes in the networking landscape.
For instance, as organisations embrace the cloud, networking grows in complexity along with system, process and workload design.
Security, of course, is still seen as a major stumbling block to cloud adoption and a lot of organisations will delay moving to the cloud until they’ve seen success stories from mission-critical workloads.
“Cloud computing relies on shared computing resources rather than having local servers or personal devices to handle applications. Storage, applications and other services are accessed via the Internet and paid for by the cloud customer using an as-needed or pay-per-use business model.
“Private clouds are maintained by individual enterprises, while public cloud is managed and hosted by third-parties,” Fouche adds.
“In the public versus private cloud debate, decision-makers need to consider factors such as costs, the skills-set of their in-house IT team, security and data control. There are obviously also those who advocate a hybrid cloud solution. Each possibility brings its own advantages and so should arguably be looked at on a case-by-case basis.”
Because public cloud is an open computing environment where people anywhere in the world can buy – or even have free access to – a small portion of storage on the cloud, it is most commonly associated with consumer use for personal documents and photos. Public cloud offerings also offer paid-for services, storage or applications for business use.
“Public cloud can also present vulnerabilities to small businesses. Because you are sharing space with other consumers, public clouds can be unpredictable and unstable, unlike private cloud environments,” Fouche says. “Many people think that private cloud environments are slower and less cost-effective than public cloud, while also not offering the flexibility, agility and scalability that public cloud is known for. However, today, a private cloud can work for your organisation to be efficient, safe, and cost-effective, when managed with the right tools.”
Meanwhile, organisations are having to find new ways to design and architect their networks as new use cases like Internet of Things, data analytics and remote working meet new software-defined technologies.
Networks Unlimited offers leading solutions and services to partners to help them ensure that their enterprise customers can overcome the many challenges they face in the connected world.
“Most of our solutions address the higher-end of the market – and they are all market leaders,” says Fouche.
While the fundamental principles of network design haven’t changed dramatically over the years, there have been some subtle but significant switches, he adds.
“There are small rules and ways in which we put networks together that have changed. For instance, software-defined networking (SDN) has taken a lot of the complexity out of enterprise networks.
“MPLS is a tremendously difficult and complex protocol to work with, but SDN removes that almost entirely.”
It’s just as well that complexity is being removed from networking, because the technology is changing so quickly it would be difficult for companies to keep up – and customers don’t want to have to worry about speed or capability.
Built-in security is a non-negotiable these days, Fouche adds. “You have to make sure you do your homework up front and consider security from the beginning. Fortunately, most of our products have security built in as it is absolutely essential.”
Another big trend in IT, artificial intelligence (AI), is starting to make its mark in the storage and networking arenas too, Fouche says.
“AI is becoming a serious player,” he explains. “Most of our products use some form of AI to make things easier in terms of management of error checking.”
New intelligence capabilities will be particularly useful for edge applications like Internet of Things in vertical industries, Fouche adds. Smart buildings, agriculture and security all have applications for AI and IoT.
And, contrary to fears that new technologies like AI are going to cost us jobs, Fouche believes they will be instrumental in creating jobs we haven’t thought of yet.
“This is the exciting part of it for me; where technology is taking us,” he says. “Change is constant, and we have to embrace it.”
In a changing world, the underlying technology is more important than ever, Fouche adds. “Technology change is getting faster and faster, with new chipsets and solutions coming out.”
Most of NU’s product offerings are built to give customers an advantage in this environment. “They can accommodate changes on the fly, and are built on total open platforms.
“There has traditionally been a tendency in our industry for networking vendors to create totally closed proprietary technology.”
NU value-added services
NU offers all the professional services that partners need to make sure they deliver a quality network to their customers.
“We are not a traditional ‘stack ‘em high and move them fast’ distributor,” explains Fouche. “We are a value-added distributor.”
This means that NU has all the skills and resources in-house to do network design and implementation for its partners. But is also works hard on empowering its partners to build their own resources.
“For most of the products we carry, we are also training our partners, and thus empowering the reseller community out there.”
This is vital in the networking world, he adds, because of the long-term costs associated with these technologies.
“Typically, 30% of the traditional networking implementation cost is in the acquisition of the hardware. A massive 70% to 80% of the cost is utilised in keeping the network up and running.”
Part of Fouche’s job is to make sure NU is always at the forefront of the technology curve. “I constantly look at the new technologies that will put us at the leading edge.
“Because of our size – not too big, not too small – we can easily adapt and take on new challenges.
“So we are always on the lookout for technologies that would be of benefit to the reseller and in the end user environment. We’ve recently signed up a few new vendors to complement the leading edge solutions already in our stable.”