Global Study Reveals Increased SD-WAN Deployments, But Networking and Security Challenges Persist

CAMPBELL, Calif., Oct. 25, 2018 /PRNewswire/ --

Highlights:

• 98% of IT leaders cited networking challenges with their current WAN setup.
• One-third have already deployed SD-WAN in most of their sites, and 49% are in the process of doing so or will in the next year.
• 70% of IT leaders said they risk losing a competitive advantage if they don't update their WAN.
• 92% agree security should be the No. 1 priority when considering an SD-WAN solution.

Barracuda Networks, Inc., a leading provider of cloud-delivered security and data protection solutions today released key findings from a new global research report, "Security, Connectivity, and Control: The Challenges and Opportunities of SD-WAN." Commissioned by Barracuda, the study surveyed IT leaders and networking and security professionals to learn how widespread SD-WAN deployments are, how organizations are deploying them, and what benefits and challenges they're seeing.

Read the full report: barracuda.com/SDWANresearch

The report includes data from more than 900 respondents in the Americas, EMEA, and APAC. Respondents come from companies ranging from 1,000 to more than 5,000 employees across multiple sectors, including healthcare, finance, education, manufacturing, public sector, and retail.

Overall, the study indicates that SD-WAN deployments are increasing to address networking challenges resulting from the explosive growth of WAN traffic due to high demand for cloud applications and services. Security remains a top concern for an overwhelming majority of IT leaders as they consider upgrading to an SD-WAN solution. Highlights include:

• Networking challenges are common with current WAN setups.
• Top three challenges are complexity (48%), cloud performance (47%), and performance between locations (46%).
• SD-WAN deployments are on the rise.
• One-third have already deployed SD-WAN in most of their sites, and 49 percent are in the process of doing so or will in the next year.
• 70 percent of IT leaders said they risk losing a competitive advantage if they don't update their WAN.
• Security is a top priority when choosing an SD-WAN solution.
• 81 percent said advanced threat protection and centralized management were very important or crucial to their SD-WAN purchase.
• SD-WAN offers improved security and lower costs.
• Most common benefits of SD-WAN deployments are improved network security (57%), connectivity (56%), and network flexibility and agility (53%).
• Nearly half of respondents said they had reduced overall costs thanks to SD-WAN, and 36 percent reduced costs specifically for MPLS services.

"These findings show that as IT professionals increasingly turn to SD-WAN to address their networking challenges, they're looking for solutions that provide security, simplicity, and cost savings," said Klaus Gheri, VP, Network Security, Barracuda. "Barracuda meets those needs by offering a single solution combining advanced security and SD-WAN."

With secure SD-WAN and advanced security, Barracuda CloudGen Firewalls are an all-in-one solution that can be deployed on premises as a physical or virtual appliance or in the cloud, redefining the role of a firewall and helping customers optimize distributed networks.

Resources:

Read the Blogs:
Security Top Concern for Organizations Transitioning to SD-WAN: http://cuda.co/33960

EMEA Businesses Turn to SD-WAN in Spite of Lack of Education: http://cuda.co/33958

Download the Report:
Security, Connectivity and Control: The Challenges and Opportunities of SD-WAN: barracuda.com/SDWANresearch

Watch the Videos:
Barracuda SD-WAN Overview: bit.ly/SDWANoverview 
Barracuda Advanced Security for Your SD-WAN: bit.ly/SDWANsecurity  
Barracuda SD-WAN Zero-Touch Deployment: bit.ly/SDWANdeploy  
Barracuda Application Optimization for SD-WAN: bit.ly/SDWANoptimize 
Barracuda ATP for SD-WAN: bit.ly/SDWANatp

Get More Information:
Barracuda SD-WAN: barracuda.com/sd-wan

About Barracuda Networks, Inc. 
Barracuda simplifies IT with cloud-enabled solutions that empower customers to protect their networks, applications and data, regardless of where they reside. These powerful, easy-to-use and affordable solutions are trusted by more than 150,000 organizations worldwide and are delivered in appliance, virtual appliance, cloud and hybrid deployment configurations. Barracuda's customer-centric business model focuses on delivering high-value, subscription-based IT solutions that provide end-to-end network and data protection. For additional information, please visit barracuda.com.

Barracuda Networks, Barracuda, and the Barracuda Networks logo are registered trademarks of Barracuda Networks, Inc. in the US and other countries.   

Contacts
Jonelle Elam                                                    
Barracuda Networks, Inc.                      
408-342-6415                                        
[email protected]   

SOURCE Barracuda Networks, Inc.