23 December 2016
Equinix customers can now use Citrix’s SD-WAN platform for connecting to the Equinix Cloud Exchange.
Citrix has partnered with global interconnection data centre company Equinix in an effort to help customers move confidently to a hybrid cloud architecture.
The solution leverages an Equinix Performance Hub to provide an SD-WAN solution that that connects an enterprise’s locations to one of Equinix’s more than 145 data centres around the world.
Citrix says the connections are built with its NetScaler SD-WAN. They consist of secure tunnels established over multiple aggregated network links, including public internet, MPLS and wireless.
According to the firm, this enables Equinix Performance Hub customers to use SD-WAN as a cost-effective, reliable and secure option for connecting to the Equinix Cloud Exchange.
It says they can then take advantage of the exchange’s hybrid interconnection model for providing high-speed and low-latency connectivity between multiple cloud providers and enterprise networks.
It’s claimed the combination of NetScaler SD-WAN and Equinix enables companies to support a variety of application delivery strategies, and allows them to select technologies based on what works best for their business, now and in the future.
For example, by using the combined solution, enterprises can directly connect from each branch location to the nearest Equinix location using SD-WAN technology and then use the company’s Cloud Exchange to achieve low latency and cost efficient connections to SaaS applications.
The partners say this brings a “high level” of network reliability. As a result, they reckon customers can be confident that they won’t lose their connection and will maintain high application performance even when using public broadband connections, as NetScaler SD-WAN always selects the best path for each application.
Other benefits of the joint solution are said to include the ability for users to build complex applications using interactive workloads, incorporate hybrid cloud as disaster recovery strategy, and take advantage of broadband and wireless connections.
With the latter, Citrix says that instead of using expensive private links to connect to the primary corporate data centre and then to the cloud, users can connect directly from each office to the cloud using any combination of broadband and wireless networks.
The company says this reduces network cost, while increasing the reliability and resulting application performance.
It adds that with NetScaler SD-WAN’s metering capability, wireless and satellite networks can also be utilised cost effectively if needed as a last resort connection in case of a failure of all other links.
