With the growing adoption of cloud technologies and the need for secure connectivity, SASE has emerged as a critical framework for combining networking and security functions. Today, we have the Co-founder and Chief Development Officer at Versa, Kumar Mehta, who will shed light on the top trends, the impact of SASE on cloud adoption, effective data protection strategies, and best practices for adopting a SASE framework. Let’s dive into the world of SASE and explore its transformative potential.
1. What are some of the top trends that revolve around SASE currently?
In December 2022, Gartner released its six trends anticipated to significantly impact infrastructure and operations over the next 12 to 18 months. SASE was at the top of the list. The analyst firm forecasts that total worldwide end-user spending on SASE will reach $9.2 billion in 2023, a 39% increase from 2022. This growth is driven by the adoption of Cloud and Work from Anywhere by enterprises.
In 2019, Gartner coined SASE as a technology framework for the convergence of networking and security in cloud-native environments. This is the very genesis of Versa in 2012. We realized then that there was no network worth having without built-in security. We are glad that Gartner has recognized the same 7 years later!
In tech-savvy markets like India, we are seeing rapid adoption of this framework with BFSI leading the way, followed by IT/ITeS, Manufacturing, Healthcare, Government, and other verticals. We have been growing at greater than 100% in India and developing markets. We see this upward trend continuing for the next few years.
2. How does SASE fuel the growth of cloud adoption by ensuring secured connectivity to any applications and devices?
SASE is an architecture that bundles network and security-as-a-service functions together and delivers them as a single service, with deployment options as per the customer requirements managed through a single management console. Enterprises are moving applications and workloads to multiple clouds. Additionally, they are adopting SaaS applications at a rapid pace. The primary objective of a SASE framework is to allow users, devices, and sites to access these applications from anywhere, anytime. All the above are being managed through a single pane of glass, with the consistency of policy definition and applications, supported through a unified data lake for all functions and provided through a single unified infrastructure architecture of Network and Point of Presence (PoPs). Such a solution provides improved risk posture, the lowest TCO, the lowest Opex and the best user experience. SASE acts as a perfect catalyst for cloud adoption by providing a combination of enforcement of multi-dimensional policies, advanced threat filtering and prevention, while ensuring the best user experience, thereby eliminating the risk involved in a security breach and data theft.
3. With the ever-increasing threat of cyberattacks, how can enterprises protect their data most effectively given that there are a plethora of offerings from different vendors that one can select?
The current universe of SASE solutions can be classified into two types of offers, i.e., Unified SASE and Disaggregated SASE. Most of the vendors would be associated with disaggregated SASE category since they have adopted a bolt-on SASE approach of combining SASE functions through partnerships and acquisitions. Only a handful of vendors have built a Unified SASE solution from the ground up. Dell’Oro Group, which is the trusted source of market information about the telecommunications, security, networks, and data center infrastructure industries, very recently announced that the Versa AI/ML powered Unified SASE has the largest market share, two years in a row.
Enterprises must choose a vendor that can deliver a unified platform for SASE services such as Secure SD-WAN, Next-Generation Firewall, Next-Generation Firewall as a Service, Cloud Network Firewall, Unified Threat Management (UTM) including Advanced Threat Protection (ATP), Secure Web Gateway (SWG), Zero Trust
Versa Networks
Network Access (ZTNA), Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB), Data Loss Prevention (DLP), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI), and User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA). This Unified SASE platform should go above and beyond management console automation by providing the ability to integrate networks, points of presence, policy definitions, application definitions, agent logic, and data lakes. Such a solution provides improved risk posture, lowest TCO, lowest Opex and best user experience.
4. What approach should a customer have while trying to adopt a SASE Framework?
With new technological advancements happening at a rapid pace, relatively newer organizations like Versa, for example, are leading the way and are miles ahead of much established stodgy players in this domain. I would like to suggest that one should evaluate newer technologies like AI/ML powered Unified SASE platform from companies like Versa and see the results for themselves instead of sticking to stodgy legacy vendors. Many of the world’s biggest organizations are managing their mission-critical workloads and applications through our platform. Customers who are new to this technology can start with a relatively less critical service and then slowly migrate to the full stack once they realize the value for themselves.
