Andre Kindness

Software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) has started to ride off into the sunset (which is long overdue). For some time, you might see some vendors wandering around aimlessly, hoping to sell you a SD-WAN solution, but for the most part, the networking market is moving on. It didn’t happen like I predicted. I thought the SD-WAN acronym […]

Over the last decade and a half, networking vendors have been using various methods to bundle wired, wireless, voice over IP, and security products into a solution sale. These companies tried various combinations of routers, WAN optimization, security, Wi-Fi, switching, and voice over IP (VoIP). No single hardware product had all the services, but most […]

On March 31, Palo Alto Networks announced the intent to acquire CloudGenix, a software-defined WAN appliance vendor. This was another announcement in a long list from the security and networking industries about merging together SDWAN and security. Such combinations are inevitable because: SDWAN adoption hasn’t matched the hype. Here is a dirty little secret: SDWAN […]

The rollout of 5G is much more evolutionary than the rollout scenarios of previous cellular standards.

I just hung up the phone and can’t stop shaking my head. This was the second call this week from an organization looking for a workaround to deal with the shortcomings of a networking component. Taking inquiries and trying to help clients solve challenges is a common element of my job. This can be tough […]

I noticed an interesting phenomenon at Interop, which sparked my theory on new network technologies. New network technology maturity and its adoption correlate directly to the five stages of loss: 1) denial; 2) anger; 3) bargaining; 4) depression; and 5) acceptance. For example, Interop break-out sessions on cloud and bring your own device (BYOD) now mostly […]

Historically I have not been a big fan of Interop for a variety of reasons. However Greg Ferro, George Stefanick, Ivan Pepelnjak, and Harvard Business Review IT Director Ken Griffin — to name a few — changed the breakout sessions experience for me. During Greg’s data center network session, he said something that was priceless. […]

I’m getting a lot calls from clients who are using “white box” and “bare metal” interchangeably when discussing network switches. It might not seem like a big deal, but it is when customers are trying to accomplish a certain task and are examining the wrong products or don’t see the full picture. This is especially […]

Wow. Certain networking vendors have started to declare they are winners, while others say software defined network (SDN) is over. All I have to say (in my best George Takei voice) is, “Oh, my!” I’m lucky enough to spend most of my day interacting with many end users to know that those statements clearly show how […]

I’m getting inundated with briefing requests from vendors either coming out with their own white box offerings or somehow supporting the white box market. While white box network solutions provide great value for some industries, more than likely, they are not for your infrastructure but for specific industries such as web scale or high-frequency trading […]

Forrester brought the wireless Forrester Wave™ back from the grave after an end-of-life announcement of it in 2007. Too many wireless innovations and changes in the vendor landscape have emerged not to dig it up and examine today’s solutions. The Forrester Wave: Wireless Local Area Network Solutions evaluated 10 wireless systems — Aerohive Solution, Aruba Mobility-Defined […]

The recent business articles about customers screaming for change, such as Bloomberg’s recently published article about Goldman Sachs’ CIO threatening Cisco, conjures up images of Dee Snider busting through the wall and screaming, “OH, WE'RE NOT GONNA TAKE IT ANYMORE! WE'VE GOT THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE, AND THERE AIN'T NO WAY WE'LL LOSE IT! THIS IS […]

If a network vendor representative starts off with any of these three phrases — software-defined networking (SDN),bring-your-own-device (BYOD), or lower total cost of ownership (TCO) — I would ask them to leave and come back when they have done their homework on your business. Why? Because clearly they don’t know what your business does and […]

Cisco released its 1st quarter financial statement last week, and the numbers weren’t pretty. But this shouldn’t surprise too many, since the company warned the financial community that the revenue growth was going to be below their expectations. Unlike most, I see this as more of an inflection point in an undulation that swings back into […]

Ten years ago, if I had stood up in front of IT professionals and said that their company would allow employees to bring their own devices to work in lieu of corporate-owned devices, I would have been heckled out of the room, but look at where we are today. Well, I am here to say […]

A few weeks ago, Cisco announced plans for its “spin-in” investment, Insieme Networks: The newest next-generation data center network called, Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI).This new offering includes hardware (the Cisco Nexus 9000 series), new firmware (enhanced version of NX-OS), and a new controller (Application Policing Infrastructure Controller). Even though Cisco’s ACI launch indicates the magnitude […]

Forrester has just completed a comprehensive analysis of data center networking solutions from Alcatel-Lucent, Arista Networks, Avaya, Brocade Communication Systems, Cisco Systems, Extreme Networks, Hewlett-Packard, and Juniper Networks. Instead of comparing just the vendors’ features and functions and positioning them accordingly, we took an outside-in approach. We stepped into the customer’s shoes and crafted 85 questions […]

After Hurricane Sandy forced the closure of the NYSE, the market opened up a week ago Wednesday morning with Riverbed’s stock price plunging 20%, while some financial analysts downgraded the company from “hold” to “underperform.” The financial institutions felt that Riverbed’s WAN optimization market was commoditizing and viewed its acquisition of OpNet for $1 billion as a company looking to enhance its […]

Is it me, or does the network industry remind you of Revenge of the Nerds? Networking was cast aside in the cloud revolution, but now companies are learning — the painful way – what a mistakes that was.  Don’t kid yourself one bit if you think that VMware’s acquisition of Nicirawas mostly about developing heterogeneous […]