Taking the power of SDN another step ahead towards the enterprise community, HP has unveiled new campus networking solutions and services that support customers on their path to a mobile-ready workplace that enhances business productivity.
The new campus networking solutions – which include the HP 5400R zl2 Switch Series v3 Modules and the HP Network Visualizer SDN App – lay the foundation for simplified enterprise networks engineered for performance, security, visibility, and optimization of the digital enterprise. Software-defined networking (SDN) capabilities allow IT professionals to easily administer network operations and troubleshooting, as well as enforce security policies in a rapid, simplified, agile manner.
Preparing the campus to accelerate the mobile workplace
As Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) becomes commonplace and the Internet of Things is introduced into organizations of all types, enterprises need to deliver the mobile experience users expect. HP’s new campus solutions lay the groundwork for a mobile-ready infrastructure that leverages ASIC innovation and SDN technology to address challenges such as security, application performance and network monitoring.
The new HP 5400R zl2 Switch Series v3 modules are powered by the 6th generation HP Networking ASIC, purpose built for the SDN era, allowing it to deliver more than four times the performance of competitive solutions, and three times lower latency. Its two terabits per second backplane supports increased bandwidth and performance requirements including high speed wireless connectivity. The 5400R v3 fully supports OpenFlow and can process up to 24 times more flows than it main competitor, allowing multiple concurrent apps with service insertion, unmatched by merchant silicon. Programmable OpenFlow processing pipelines and ten parallel Advanced Packet Processor engines with dedicated resources provide scalability and flexibility to support the new wave of SDN applications.
“To continue providing high-end computing services to the scientific community across Germany, we needed to upgrade our network and ensure it could support continuous technology developments,” said Günter May, Network Planning, The Leibniz Supercomputing Centre. “With high speed connectivity and bandwidth to support the growing number of devices on our network, the 5400R switch series not only provides agility so that we can deliver students and staff a better application experience, but it also opens the door to SDN features for us.”
SDN simplifies network management and improves security
The new HP Network Visualizer SDN application provides IT administrators with real-time detailed visibility of the network to monitor traffic flow and investigate issues. Administrators can easily identify user complaints without having to identify physical location or IP address, by centering visibility on the user experience rather than the physical network. The increased visibility afforded by SDN technology allows for rapid diagnosis and repair of network issues, without requiring additional costly overlay appliances or probes.
In addition to network visibility challenges, more connected devices bring increased security risk. To help prevent malicious threats from entering the network via employee devices, HP announced enhancements to its HP Network Protector SDN application, which provides zero-touch dynamic threat protection at the edge of the network for securing BYOD. The application now includes Intrusion Prevention System as a service, and provides consistent business level policy across the wired and wireless network.
HP also announced enhancements to its HP Network Optimizer SDN application, which offers automated provisioning of network policy and Quality of Service to ensure an enhanced user experience. The app now offers media path optimization as well as dynamic traffic periodization based on user or device. Other business applications will also be able to take full advantage of HP Network Optimizer through open API integration.
