Why Your SD-WAN Deployment is Failing

我要说一些你可能不想听到的东西，或者你可能已经知道 - 实施SD-WAN很难。在自动化的承诺和炒作中，动态路径选择，零触摸配置和云准备好的云，谎言失败的SD-WAN项目，许多其他人在生命支持上努力。对于许多人来说，未来的WAN未能表现出任何难以管理的艰难管理的东西，这已经未能履行其承诺（或者未能达到您的期望），但为什么？

SD-WAN解决方案地址的问题不是增量变化或逐渐发展。它们是行业Megatrends的结果，这些产品已经上历了我们消耗应用程序并将用户联系的方式，所有这些都在很短的时间内。这些Megatrends（如数字转型和转向SaaS），IAAS和云的移动已经对网络基础设施，IT人员和应用程序所有者提供了新的需求，这需要完全重新思考它们是如何连接地点的，提供应用程序和服务并保护其网络。这些变化的纯粹重力和需要进行支持的范围，不能以添加方法进行。相反，他们必须被视为需要完全重新思考企业WAN设计和策略的变革项目。

Thankfully there is hope for those who have tried and failed, and for those who have not yet embarked on their journey. It is possible to have a successful implementation that delivers on the promise of SD-WAN – you just need the right partner, product and process to do it.

人，合作伙伴和焦点是一切

This is something that is hard to evaluate on paper, but it should be immediately apparent from the moment you engage. Expertise is everything in SD-WAN projects, and you don’t want someone who is learning alongside you. You need a partner who can guide you through the tough design and architecture decisions, demonstrate a repeatable process to follow that’s worked with countless other customers and takes into account the pitfalls to look out for as you move forward. Picking the right partner could mean the difference between life and death for your SD-WAN project early on.

Partners involved in this process could involve a variety of people. The technology vendor, its SD-WAN products and resources to support you through the design, deployment and post sales processes. The channel partner working alongside you, and service providers, systems integrators or managed service providers—all play critical roles in the success of your project. When engaging with partners there are some things you need to look for.

Are chosen partners laser focused on the success of your SD-WAN project, or is it just another SKU for them on a long list of products? Have they done it before? Do they have a track record of successful customer deployments using their SD-WAN solution? Do the local systems engineering resources you engage with appear to be specialized in this space, or are they just generalized across a portfolio of products requiring specialists to be flown in from all over? When you open a TAC case is the engineer an SD-WAN product expert, or will it require multiple levels of escalation to get you to who you need?

还有问题如何确保您自己的团队具有成功的项目具有正确的技能。伟大的事情是SD-WAN技术仍然是网络产品，因此他们利用您的团队应该已经知道的许多相同的核心概念;但是，他们仍然带有学习曲线。重要的是要确保您与您所在的合作伙伴提供全面的培训和认证，以帮助快速工具团队成为他们将部署和支持的技术的专家。它并不罕见，通常是可取的，以确保您的团队采取必要的课程和认证，导致您的部署。这也是一个很好的想法，看看您正在参与的供应商或合作伙伴是否提供部署援助，以帮助为您的团队提供额外的知识和专业知识，以实现真正的世界级经验。

这一切都很重要。确保将所有合作伙伴通过测试进行评估，以评估他们的专业知识，在整个过程中获取培训和整体参与，而不仅仅是他们的产品。如果您发现初始参与是摇摇晃晃的，那么他们并不真正知道他们在谈论什么，或者似乎似乎有太多的体验，想象一下，一旦你开始尝试部署就会发生这种情况。

The Right Product Really Matters

WAN是关键任务基础设施;它允许用户和设备连接到网络，最重要的是他们的应用程序。没有WAN什么都没有，没有人的作用。SD-WAN产品必须处理的独特挑战，例如使WAN云准备并将多个设备巩固到一个统一平台，同时执行所有统一平台，仍然必须与遗留网络互操作和协议。这很多。

It’s important to work with a partner that specializes in the WAN and has a clear understanding of the challenges and product needs to address them. Integration with legacy routing protocols such as BGP and OSPF are important, and the ability to still work across an SD-WAN fabric as well as MPLS networks to talk to legacy non-SD-WAN sites is critical. The ability to provide a smooth journey for non-SD-WAN sites to gracefully enter the new SD-WAN fabric is also paramount, because nobody turns on SD-WAN overnight at every location. The solution at the same time still needs to deliver an amazing SD-WAN experience providing you with a no-compromise WAN strategy that results in better performance, control and reliability of applications on your network and in the cloud, with better economics and agility for your infrastructure, processes and people that support them. It takes a well-thought out approach and powerful solution to get it right.

然而，有一个重要的平衡。WAN边缘的变化和创新有很大的需要，但在这种转变期间也存在与传统网络合作的同样重要的需求。您可能会发现一些解决方案在一个方向或另一个方向上提供不平衡的方法。有些人对SD-WAN有太多关注，他们与遗留协议和基础设施不适，而其他人则致力于使用遗产基础设施，并没有足够的专注于SD-WAN创新。这两种情况都可以对您的项目造成致命的打击，并且无法提供有形的福利。

Make sure to thoroughly evaluate leading solutions. Don’t just fall back to your legacy network or security vendor assuming they are providing the innovation or expertise you need. Much of this evaluation is something you should be able to easily do on the whiteboard, through product demonstrations and discussions. After the paper evaluation, shortlist your vendors and partners for more in-depth demonstrations, production pilots and evaluations of their technology and experience.

It All Comes Down to Planning and Execution

Now that you have the right people, partner and product it all comes down to execution. This is as equally important a pillar as any other. SD-WAN projects involve replacing critical infrastructure in the branch. Very often that means multiple routers, firewalls and WAN optimization devices must be consolidated down into a single unified SD-WAN platform. Removing this legacy equipment and software stack requires a well-coordinated plan to get it right with minimal disruption. Thankfully doing this work ahead of time can make your SD-WAN deployment go much more easily.

There are three key areas you need to focus on when starting this planning work.

First, you must understand how your SD-WAN solution connects into your data center, cloud and security stack. You need to have a standard template for the new branch architecture, identify how your applications will utilize this new WAN, and plan for how your legacy sites will interoperate until they become SD-WAN sites. Second, if there are other major changes taking place such as a move to cloud security services like Zscaler or Check Point, those should also be planned for at this time. And finally, once this architecture is well understood, you need to document your rollout process, test your rollout plan at a handful of sites to work out the kinks, document and refine your process and then start deploying.

SD-WAN网站应该部署在模板,highly repeatable fashion. When deploying you should be following a script, IP addressing and port mapping should be well documented ahead of time, and the cutover and validation process should be well understood. If you find yourself struggling to do these things during your rollout, go back and start this process over again until it’s well refined. If you’re planning on deploying hundreds or thousands of sites, make sure your technology partners have the ability to automate much of this deployment process.

其次，根据您的资源，流程和程序，涉及合作伙伴提供共同管理，专业服务或向您提供的交钥匙管理服务可能也很重要。虽然这些合作伙伴可以提供更加雄辩的方法，但重要的是要确保他们也有很好的理解流程，经验和经验丰富的计划，以帮助您顺利地推出您的解决方案。了解他们提供的SD-WAN产品也很重要，并将其作为评估的一部分包含。合适的产品是SD-WAN成功的关键支柱之一。即使您将SD-WAN作为托管服务购买，您也应该理解引擎盖下的内容。

Lastly, there may be other external factors that you need to consider. If you’re planning on adding new circuits to a site such as MPLS, DIA, broadband, LTE or 5G, determine if they are available at your different locations. Can you deploy with your current infrastructure, and add them later if they aren’t available today? If there are things that may prolong your deployment, it’s better to identify and plan for them ahead of time whenever possible.

Through the planning process, you should be able to build a comprehensive plan of attack that once completed, and tested, makes this all a relatively easy process. We’ve seen as many as 50 sites per day cutover at a single customer once this process is refined and executed upon.

In Conclusion

As with anything, you get out what you put in. To be successful in SD-WAN, whether it’s as a vendor, partner or end-user, it requires the right set of people, the product that best fits your needs and the planning and execution that you should expect with any large project. The benefits of SD-WAN are tangible, and the market has moved far beyond the hype. Realizing a multiplier effect, delivering better performance, reliability, security and control across your SaaS, IaaS and other cloud investments is entirely possible. A successful SD-WAN deployment isn’t a matter of if, but who with.

This blog was originally published by Silver Peak, which was acquired by Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company.