What is Network as a Service (NaaS)?
Adopting as-a-Service (aaS) models, like software, infrastructure, and cloud has enabled companies to serve customers better and quickly adapt to the ever-evolving business landscape.
Extreme agility, easy scalability, enhanced security, and a streamlined OpEx cost model are some of the transformational benefits aaS models bring to businesses. However, the campus enterprise network has lagged in this evolution – growing network complexities, costs and unsecure infrastructure are holding today’s businesses back from adopting authentic true aaS models.
The last 18 months have seen the rise of network as a service (NaaS) in various forms of which share a common purpose: to leverage the advantages of cloud computing by bringing aaS models into enterprise networks.
Complexities that burden today’s enterprise networks
The complex nature of many current enterprise networks results from decades of technologies layered to meet evolving business trends and needs. This complexity often holds business’ productivity, security, and innovation back.
Today’s networks are built upon a three-decade-old foundation of wired architectures. The evolution of wireless technologies, IoT devices, security, and segmentation requires IT expertise in threading these disparate technologies together while performing ongoing configuration adjustments to ensure security and optimal performance.
Network complexities begin with architecture and design while also extending into sifting through lists of SKUs to determine the most accurate yet budget-friendly infrastructure to procure. Day 0 installation, provisioning, and configuration require extensive certification and certified experts on board until the network runs, which can take up to a few weeks. This complexity extends into the entire network lifecycle with change management of configuration updates, hardware refreshes, software upgrades, and security patches critical to the network’s reliability and uptime. Today’s IT teams spend most of their time weeding through these network complexities of daily network management.
Why NaaS?
How does NaaS offload the burden of today's enterprise networks?
A big driver for NaaS is the sheer complexity of today’s enterprise networks, which is driving modern enterprises to seek simple and efficient solutions.4
Network operations (NetOps) is the most time-consuming and expensive part of the network lifecycle. 70% of enterprises lack the plan to mitigate supply chain issues for network hardware. For these firms, network OpEx costs will rise 15% per year over the next five years.3
IT teams are responsible for delivering secure and reliable connectivity to every authenticated network user. This experience must also seamlessly fulfill the demands of an ever-evolving user base and the increase in devices and applications that come onto the network. NaaS is a way of offloading the burden that comes with network management to give back time to IT, enabling them to focus on strategic initiatives to help the business grow.
| Today's Enterprise Networks | How NaaS Adds Value |
|---|---|
| Extensive time and money spent to choose and purchase hardware and software. | Offloads infrastructure ownership and reduces upfront CapEx costs. |
| Requires certified technicians & experts for installation, provisioning, and configuration. | Owns Day 0 network activities: network installation, planning, and installation. |
| Time-consuming network monitoring and management that underutilizes IT’s time and skills. | Guarantees network performance levels via proactive monitoring and optimization. |
| Time consuming and risky lifecycle management: software updates, security patches, and technology/refreshes. | Takes on the burden of lifecycle management, inclusive of new features delivery. |
What do NaaS offerings look like today?
Gartner observed that legacy network equipment vendors struggle to deliver on NaaS expectations due to a focus on per-box consumption instead of as-a-Service consumption. The result is a network architecture dependent on feature adoption and upgrades. The way many network as a service solutions are delivered today embodies a lease around traditional legacy equipment that offers an incomplete bundle of hardware as a service rather than a holistic network as a service.
“
Network as a Service (not to be confused with hardware as a service) is emerging and shifts the emphasis of network procurement from boxes and widgets to business outcomes.
– Mark Toussaint, Gartner
By 2024, 70% of vendors marketing NaaS will not meet the core definition of NaaS.2 Most of their offerings are a combination of the following:
- Various bundles of legacy hardware software and support licenses
- Per-box consumption without Day 0-N lifecycle management
- Utilizing multiple vendors results in limited interoperability
- Disparate multiple contracts with complex pricing/subscription structure
“
The challenge is that vendors have a tendency to call everything NaaS, and it really isn’t NaaS half the time.
– Andrew Lerner, Gartner
What are the critical criteria of true NaaS?
Many organizations are ready to shed the last three decades of campus networking and shift to the benefits of NaaS. IDC’s “Key Criteria When Selecting a NaaS Solution” defines what it means to deliver true NaaS.
Key NaaS Components
Flexible consumption
Shift from traditional CapEx models to a flexible and agile consumption model. The dynamic structure of NaaS allows for monthly billing based on actual usage, scaling up or down.
End-to-end operations management
Service level driven
Network as Service means delivering a holistic, outcome-oriented service. Modern organizations need a change from best-effort “response times” to guaranteed service levels.
Built-in security
Security should be integral to any networking solution versus being a costly add-on to protect against increasingly sophisticated threats.
NaaS by Nile
- Guaranteed service levels.
Availability, capacity, and coverage – backed by service credits.
- Zero trust built-in by default.
Engineered to prevent unauthorized network access and abolish malware proliferation.
- Pay-per-user. Scale up or down.
Holistic consumption model based simply on pay-by-use.
- Complete lifecycle management.
Offload network management from Day 0 – Day N, freeing IT resources to focus on strategic initiatives.
REPORT BY IDC
Key Criteria When Selecting a NaaS Solution
Read about the significant changes underway in how organizations across the world are buying and managing enterprise network infrastructure.
2 Hype Cycle for Enterprise Networking 2022. Gartner, June 29, 2022
3 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Wired and Wireless LAN Infrastructure 2022
4 Brandon Butler, IDC, April 2022
5 Gartner Deems NaaS, MCNS Key Network Innovations
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