XON, which represents Juniper Networks in South Africa, has unveiled a range of new Juniper software, services, systems and partnerships that will help enterprise IT dramatically reduce the cost and complexity of data centre networking while also improving application and business performance.
The "new network" for data centres is fuelled by critical innovations in automation, virtualisation and fabric technologies, which can cut time to operation by up to 50% and eliminate up to 35% of data centre networking capital expenditures.
The company has also announced new switches and the delivery of new routers that yield up to a five-fold and eight-fold improvement in network performance, respectively.
These announcements overcome the "old network" approach of adding more boxes to boost performance, which adds cost and complexity to the data centre.
Alternatively, optimising for economics has typically required sacrificing speed, scalability and other performance needs. Juniper has now created a "new network" alternative for customers by delivering a cloud-ready data centre architecture that eliminates trade-offs between experience and economics.
As part of the launch, Juniper is introducing new capabilities that will help customers simplify, automate and secure their enterprise and data centre networks, while providing a strong network foundation to manage and deliver cloud services:
* Simplify: Juniper's new "3-2-1" data centre network architecture will allow customers to flatten and simplify legacy data centre networks, using Juniper's breakthrough Virtual Chassis fabric technology to reduce from three to two layers today, and then collapse to one layer via Juniper's "Project Stratus" fabric in the future. Juniper also helps drive simplification through a single network OS (Junos), single software release chain, and flexible software platforms (Junos, Junos Space and Junos Pulse). Building on that software and architecture, Juniper has unveiled new 10 Gigabit Ethernet switches and routers that deliver significant improvements in network performance, along with a data centre roadmap that converges networks.
* Automate: Junos Space delivers an unmatched network application platform to automate provisioning, management and support for data centre networks, lowering the cost of operations and improving the end-user experience. This includes four new software applications based on Junos Space (introduced last October): Virtual Control software to manage physical and virtual systems from a common orchestration platform; Ethernet Design and Security Design software to enable rapid configuration and deployment of data centre networks and security policies; and Service Now with Service Insight to enable fast and proactive detection, diagnosis and resolution of network issues. To enable Virtual Control, Juniper has announced a new collaboration with VMware that takes advantage of their open APIs to achieve seamless orchestration across both physical and virtual network elements.
* Secure: Juniper's world-class network security helps IT adapt to new user behaviours and changing data flows in the data centre, driven in part by virtualisation, Web 2.0 and cloud services deployments. This "dynamic security model" is brought to life on Juniper's SRX Series Services Gateways through new AppTrack software, which gives IT managers unprecedented application and user visibility to better manage data flows and pinpoint bottlenecks. In addition, Junos Pulse (now shipping) and Junos Space (including Security Design) enable IT to dynamically manage identities, applications and policies across their network from devices to data centres. IBM has started shipping OEM versions of the SRX Series, enabling IBM customers to get the world's fastest network firewall as part of their integrated data centre solutions.
In addition to these software, systems and partnerships, Juniper has also announced a new Juniper Care Plus services portfolio for mission-critical support for enterprise customers that is designed to mitigate risk by protecting high-performance network investments while increasing reliability and operational effectiveness, and lowering operational expenses. Juniper Care Plus will keep the network at optimum readiness through designated high-touch support, proactive automation tools that help automate and simplify the network, and personalised services such as education, network consulting and account management. Juniper Care Plus will be available in South Africa through XON, which will deliver Juniper expertise, automation and support via one call.
"It is time for a fundamental change in the data centre - one that opens up the network, makes it much easier to manage, and delivers the right experiences without sacrificing economics," says Carel Coetzee, CEO of XON.
"The traditional approach of more boxes and more layers benefits legacy vendors, while burdening the customer with cost and complexity. Our approach is different, and it's fuelled by a combination of Juniper and partner innovation at the systems, software and services levels - all designed to help IT eliminate those layers of cost and complexity, while also enhancing application and business performance."
"Companies must look beyond traditional multi-layered, complex and inflexible networks to support virtualised and globally distributed data centres today and cloud computing tomorrow," says Andreas M Antonopoulos, senior VP and founding partner, Nemertes Research. "The network must become much more dynamic, flexible and automated without sacrificing performance."
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