Companies are moving more workloads from on-premises to the cloud to keep up with the need for agility and more flexibility. A recent study conducted by PwC found that a majority of enterprise workloads currently on-premises are expected to migrate to the public cloud in the next one to three years. As a result, enterprises will need to adopt even greater multicloud strategies as workloads become more distributed across IT environments.
“The promise of multicloud is to deliver an infrastructure that is secure, ubiquitous, reliable and fungible and where the migration of workloads will be a simple and intuitive process,” said Bikash Koley, CTO at Juniper Networks. “For IT to be successful in becoming multicloud-ready, it is critical organisations consider not only the data centre and public cloud, but also the on-ramps of their campus and branch networks. Otherwise, enterprises will face fractured security and operations as network boundaries prevent seamless, end-to-end visibility and control.”
To eliminate roadblocks that could prevent enterprises from realising the multicloud promise, end-to-end security and automation must be integrated throughout all places in the network. Enterprises are currently at different stages in their path toward a secure and automated multicloud architecture. Juniper’s extended offerings across its data centre, campus, branch and cloud portfolio will enable enterprises to migrate to a multicloud architecture on their terms, using natural refresh and expansion activities to meet today’s needs, while also ensuring they are multicloud-ready.
For organisations that are refreshing, expanding or consolidating data centres to prepare their IT environments for a secure and automated multicloud, Juniper is introducing new data centre solutions, including:
•Universal switch for data centre spine, data centre edge and DCI: The new QFX10002-60C switch can be flexibly used as a spine or an edge device for data centre interconnect (DCI). It features 60x100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) deep-buffer interfaces. Other new additions to Juniper’s switching portfolio include:
oThe QFX5210-64C is a 64x100GbE port spine switch.
oThe QFX5200-48Y is a 48x25GbE top-of-rack switch.
•Secure workload transitions with new line cards: The QFX MACsec line card addition to the QFX10000 modular switches provides 30-port 100GbE connectivity for encrypted traffic in and between data centres.
Recognising that campus networks will play an integral role in mutlicloud security and operations, Juniper is expanding its campus portfolio to include the following solutions:
•Simplified campus management with a single point of control: Sky Enterprise is a cloud management service that enables operators to deploy, configure and manage switching and security devices, reducing change errors by up to 90 percent. With an intuitive and easy-to-use web dashboard, managing campus and branch networks is made simpler. Sky Enterprise also gives network operators visibility into wireless access points using Aerohive Hive Manager NG API integration.
•Multigig and compact core switches: The new EX2300 and EX4300 switches bring multigig interfaces to Juniper’s campus portfolio. The 16 and 24-port campus switches support MACsec to enable a secure on-ramp to the cloud. The EX9250 switch is a compact campus core that gives enterprises multiple fabric options by supporting both a layer-2 and layer-3 using EVPN fabric.
Juniper’s branch approach supports a diverse set of software functions, while enabling applications and security control that is in sync with the rest of the network. Juniper’s extended branch portfolio prepares the branch for multicloud with the following offerings:
•New network services platform with wireless connectivity: Juniper’s NFX150 Network Services Platform combines native branch security and hybrid WAN functionality with wireless 4G and LTE connectivity between branches. Built as an extensible platform, it can run third-party virtual network functions (VNFs).
•Contrail SD-WAN with new subscription-based pricing: Juniper’s Contrail SD-WAN solution bundles the SRX Series Services Gateway and NFX Series with the platform and orchestration software required for multicloud-ready SD-WAN. New subscription pricing bundles provide several physical and virtual end point options with secure SD-WAN management.
To securely facilitate the migration of on-premises workloads to the public cloud, Juniper is offering a secure and automated way of establishing connectivity to and within public clouds.
•Secure connectivity to public cloud: Juniper’s secure cloud connectivity solution combines onboarding services with virtual products (vSRX Virtual Firewall or vMX Virtual Router) available in AWS and Azure to automate the setup of secure IPsec connectivity between data centre, campus and branch networks and Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs). The solution gives enterprises operational choice with options that include CloudFormation, TerraForm or Ansible playbooks. Juniper’s vSRX Virtual Firewall enables security within the public clouds with its versatile and powerful set of advanced security services, including anti-virus, intrusion detection and prevention (IPS) and application visibility and control through AppSecure, helping enterprises effectively handle the security challenges of multicloud.
Michael Bushong, vice president of enterprise and cloud at Juniper Networks, commented “For multicloud to yield meaningful improvements in enterprise IT, the boundaries that have historically existed between the various places in the network have to come crumbling down. And that requires end-to-end security and automated operations across the data centre, campus, branch and public cloud. We are bringing the full force of our engineering teams in a bid to simplify networking so that enterprises can migrate from legacy to multicloud-ready and eventually to full multicloud architectures.”