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Silver Peak cautions against sitting on the fence over SD-WAN
The market is reaching a tipping point and those resellers that have not yet got involved with SD-WAN need to make a decision soon
Those resellers, particularly in the networking space, that have been keeping a watchful eye on the SD-WAN market have been warned that they should not keep considering their move for much longer.
There has been lots of hype around the technology and understandably a lot of resellers have been watching and waiting for the revenue opportunities to emerge, before committing to get involved with the market.
With Silver Peak hitting the 1,500 customer mark the feeling from its EMEA channel sales director Mike Kontowtt is that the time is now for those wanting to get involved with SD-WAN.
“People have been waiting and they didn’t want to be too early but you don’t want to be too late when everyone else has gone before you. We are at the tipping point and now is the time to make the decision,” he said.
He added that the danger was that the customers were pushing for SD-WAN and those that could not offer it would lose out to rivals.
“If you are a partner and not talking about it then someone else is,” he added “If you are a connectivity provider then one of your customers might pick up on SD-WAN and if you are not offering it a rival could pick up the connectivity contract on the back of it.”
The vendor recently held its first EMEA partner conference, with more than 100 representing the channel, which physically demonstrated that interest in SD-WAN growing.
The firm is highlighting the 1,500 customer milestone as clear evidence that the market is now a real prospect for partners and those waiting for validation have now got it. The vendor has hit that number just four years after it shipped its first product to a user.
Analyst expectations are that more customers will move to SD-WAN and roll out the technology, even if on a pilot basis, shortly and the momentum in the market seen this year will continue into 2020.
Kontowtt said that as well as customers coming to SD-WAN fresh there was a second wave of customers that had been using the technology for a few years that were now looking to upgrade or move to products that would provide a better performance.
“There are a lot of organisations that have dipped their toe in with SD-WAN and tried a deployment that are now coming back as a more knowledgeable buyer,” he said.
