INDIA – The inaugural edition of World SD-WAN & SASE Summit concluded on 19 August 2021 with over 200 ITDMs tuning in from across the globe to explore the current state of network infrastructure in different regions of Asia. The summit virtually brought together the region’s key players in SD-WAN and SASE ecosystem including government officials, leading SASE solution providers and executives from significant think tanks.
The event addressed prominent issues in SD-WAN and SASE ecosystem such as Outlining possible pathways for SD-WAN evolution; Understanding SASE: The Why, What and How; Key architectural requirements of SASE; Key architectural requirements of SD-WAN; How Machine Learning changes SD-WAN; Main characteristics of the new era; and much more.
The summit featured a groundbreaking collaboration of experts such as:
– Dr IR Ismail, Director General of Spectrum Management and Standardisation of Post and ICT, Ministry of Communication and Information Technology (MCIT) of Republic of Indonesia
– Vladik Arshanski, IT Communication & Infrastructure Director, NVIDIA Networking BU
– Zeus Kerravala, Founder and Principal Analyst, ZK Research
– Boaz Avigad, Director of Product Marketing, Cato Networks
– Shashi Kiran, Chief Marketing and Product Officer, Aryaka Networks, a Cloud-First WAN company
– Vikram Dua, Sr. Director, Head of Enterprise IT Security, Philips India Ltd
– Benedict Sulaiman, VP IT, Ramsay Sime Darby Health Care
– Samuel NG, Director of Cybersecurity & Analytics, Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute (ASTRI)
– Gabriel David, CIO, LCC Group of companies
– Bijender Mishra, CISO, Alkem Laboratories Limited
– Renne Barcelona, Director and Head of IT, Global University Systems
– Geetha Gopal, Head of Infrastructure Projects Delivery and Digital Transformation, Panasonic Asia Pacific; to name a few.
While speaking about best practices for SD-WAN, Dr IR Ismail, Director General of Spectrum Management and Standardization of Post and ICT MCIT stated that, “Technological breakthroughs are still being sought to reduce the digital gap. SD-WAN could be the technology that helps to reduce the digital divide, particularly for businesses and corporations. One thing that must be ensured is that we do not want technology to look cheaper at first but ends up being very expensive. Developing ecosystem of the breakthrough technology is no less important.”
Boaz Avigad, Director and Product Marketing at CATO Networks spoke at length on the topic ‘From VPN to ZTNA to SASE – The evolution of remote access.’ He stated, “SASE is not a solution which replaces the modules we see, SASE rather is a new revolutionary network architecture which was designed to converge all of the critical components required to optimize the modern digital enterprises.”
Vladik Arshanski, IT Communication & Infrastructure Director at NVidia spoke on Nvidia’s SD-WAN journey, where he stated that, “Artificial intelligence (AI) and data science are reshaping computing and data center systems. Nvidia is dedicated to providing world-class services and solutions. Autonomous vehicles that teach, learn, and build the greatest AI and Robotics, resulting in a high level of automation.”
Shashi Kiran, Chief Marketing and Product Officer at Aryaka Networks spoke at length on understanding SASE: The why, what, and how. He was quoted saying, “SD-WAN is becoming more and more of a managed-as-a-service solution. Enterprises are searching for cloud-based architectures that are simple to use and consume.”
“Finding the right business context for network infrastructure is a big part of the game as it opens up a plethora of possibilities. However, innovations in the SD-WAN and SASE field must be contextualized and integrated into a company use case,” stated Mithun Shetty, CEO, Trescon.
The summit was hosted on the virtual events platform Vmeets which helped the participants to network and conduct business in an interactive and immersive virtual environment. Participants were also able to engage with speakers in Q&A sessions and network with solution providers in virtual exhibition booths, private consultation rooms and private networking rooms.
The inaugural edition of World SD-WAN & SASE Summit Asia was officially sponsored by Premium Gold Sponsor – CATO Networks; Gold Sponsor: Aryaka; Bronze Sponsor: Telin.
