Uplevel Brings Affordable SD-WAN to Small Business

PORTLAND, Ore., Nov. 1, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Uplevel Systems, provider of information technology (IT) infrastructure to managed service providers (MSPs), now offers software-defined Wide Area Network or "SD-WAN" capabilities optimized for small to medium businesses (SMBs).

"Any business with multiple sites, or that uses Internet phone systems, stands to benefit from SD-WAN's improved performance while dramatically reducing communications costs," says Glenn Chagnot, VP, Business Development for Uplevel Systems. "But despite the operational efficiencies, SD-WAN proves cost-prohibitive for smaller companies — until now." 

SD-WAN traditionally involves replacing costly telecom services with cost-effective Internet connections between sites. Smaller companies find SD-WAN cost-prohibitive because most offerings include advanced features and other "bells and whistles" they must pay for but do not need. In practice, the prospective cost savings also may be compromised by poorly performing Internet connections or call quality between sites.

"Businesses often deploy voice over IP (VoIP) to gain functionality and then discover that call quality suffers when the Internet gets busy," says Chagnot. "SD-WAN solves this problem by making Internet connections more reliable, but at a price most small businesses cannot afford. The Uplevel service strips away extraneous SD-WAN cost and features to deliver exceptional call quality and resiliency at roughly a quarter 25% of the price of traditional services."

Right-sizing SD-WAN for Managed SMB Services

The Uplevel solution optimizes SD-WAN for small business in four critical ways:

• Ensuring call quality for voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP): Phone systems are still the lifeblood of many small businesses and voice call quality is highly sensitive to delays of mere tenths of a second. Uplevel's integrated managed service platform includes built-in VoIP quality of service (QoS) mechanisms that ensure voice calls always receive priority over data and other "best effort" transactions and also eliminate packet loss that can lead to poor call quality.
• Reducing monthly cost by 75 percent or more: Uplevel delivers a targeted and reliable small business SD-WAN solution that removes both cost and complexity to deliver the features and benefits SMBs need. Uplevel eliminates traditional upfront costs of approximately $1,000 per site and reduces ongoing costs by 75 percent or more versus traditional solutions. Optimized for SMBs, the Uplevel approach decreases latency that impacts performance using just two normal Internet connections:

• Streamlining multi-site solutions: Along with adding failover and load balancing optimizing quality and reliability, the Uplevel solution reduces upfront equipment costs by up to $3,000 per site. Users can log in safely using secure virtual private network (VPN) services and cloud-based management allows MSPs to manage multiple sites in real time from anywhere on the device of their choice.
• Delivering cost-effective reliability: The Uplevel solution enables two SD-WAN mechanisms for improving and maintaining reliability: "Failover" whereby companies purchase a second Internet connection to provide backup, and "load balancing" in which two primary Internet connections remain in use at all times with traffic distributed to achieve the desired bandwidth at the lowest possible cost.
  
  With either approach, a failed Internet connection will slow things down but not result in complete outages and SD-WAN ensures voice calls continue to receive top priority.  

New High-growth Market for MSPs

Uplevel Systems was founded to bring affordable, reliable, higher-quality IT service to SMBs through a network of MSPs. The Uplevel solution includes Ethernet, Wi-Fi, VPNs, 1 TB storage, disaster recovery, firewall, and advanced cyber security – all available on a subscription basis with no upfront equipment costs. Uplevel delivers an instant technology upgrade that saves businesses up to $3,000 per site and makes it easier for MSPs to serve more small companies remotely via anytime, anywhere cloud-based management.

"The ability to bring affordable SD-WAN to smaller clients opens up a massive new market for us and lets us do what we like to do best—make SMBs more secure and competitive without breaking their technology budget," says Sam Sailors, President of Secure Smart Office. "Uplevel's solution ensures voice quality, reliable Internet connectivity, and the simplicity needed to make SD-WAN a very attractive option for companies with less than 100 employees."

Media Contact:
Glenn Chagnot
817.716.5103
[email protected] 

SOURCE Uplevel Systems