As businesses continue to shift to cloud-based solutions and SaaS applications, analysts have been paying close attention to the proliferation of Software-Defined WAN (SD-WAN). IDC estimates that SD-WAN hardware will hit $1.9 billion this year and continue to rise to nearly $8.05 billion in 2021. With SD-WAN headlining on the Cloud and networking stage, many in the industry are speculating what this means for MPLS.

Some argue that SD-WAN technology will help businesses overcome the high bandwidth costs and complexity of MPLS services and could serve as a viable alternative to MPLS, eventually replacing MPLS altogether. Others take a more conservative stance, stating that it is still too soon to tell if total replacement is the eventual outcome of this battle for streamlined networks.

While the future of MPLS is still unknown, what we do know today is that SD-WAN offers businesses a viable way to enhance MPLS networks with improved application and network performance. SD-WAN provides organizations with a clean way to manage failover for an additional circuit and prioritize cloud applications. Companies looking to leverage one over the other must consider what they are running over the network. For those running mission-critical, real-time applications like voice, video, and remote desktops, MPLS may still be the most effective method for this traffic type. Conversely, those businesses using the WAN solely for email, file sharing, and software applications may benefit the most from an SD-WAN deployment. While the technology may be considered a full replacement for some, it’s not entirely clear that it will serve every scenario just yet.

With so much speculation about the future of SD-WAN and MPLS, many businesses are trying to determine which technology is best suited to fit their specific networking needs. Whether it’s one or the other or a hybrid of the two, LanYap Networks is here to help you find the right solution for your business. Contact us today to learn more about SD-WAN, MPLS, and how to better streamline your network applications.