Our workloads and our ability to access them are at the center of the rapidly changing digital landscape before us. As enterprises around the globe embark on their respective digital journeys, Microsoft Azure has helped them build, test, deploy, and manage their applications. Over 95% of Fortune 500 companies choose Azure for their hybrid cloud and IaaS needs not because of past success, but rather because of focused innovation. Cisco’s partnership with Microsoft Azure has continued the history of innovation to unlock exponential value for customers.
Microsoft Azure Virtual WAN will seamlessly integrate with Cisco SD-WAN Cloud Onramp for Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), starting in Public Preview on September 21st, 2020. Through this integration, customers can extend their Cisco SD-WAN to Microsoft Azure Cloud and access Azure enterprise workloads with little or no additional configuration required.
Virtual WAN and Cloud Onramp:
The Cisco SD-WAN Cloud Onramp feature for IaaS was released in 2016, allowing customers to create transit virtual networks, set up SD-WAN edge virtual routers, and connect them. Nonetheless, the solution is an “over-the-top” solution, which plans the networking in the underlay and, therefore, lacks all capabilities that can further simplify cloud deployments.
The Cisco SD-WAN fabric has been integrated directly into Azure Virtual Network by the Virtual WAN integration between Cisco and Microsoft. Users will be able to automatically connect to other networking gateways and routers within the Cisco SD-WAN hub (e.g., ExpressRoute, IPSec VPN gateways) as well as push and pull policies or requirements to the hub within the Cisco SD-WAN hub.
As a result of using Azure Virtual WAN in this way, Cisco SD-WAN users can benefit from improved WAN performance without sacrificing security, which is always a concern, especially at the intersection of clouds and networks.
The enhanced SDWAN and vWAN integration simplify cloud deployments by automating site-to-site configuration and providing visibility into the end-to-end process in Azure,” says JL Valente, Cisco Enterprise Networking Vice President, and Product Manager.
Benefits of Joint Solutions:
Cisco Cloud Onramp provides enterprises with a high-performance alternative to MPLS/internet hybrid architecture while maintaining connectivity, continuity, and reliability across multiple clouds.
A virtual WAN connects many of Azure’s networking, security, and routing capabilities and provides a single operational interface to set up global secure access and connectivity to Azure.
Cisco Cloud Onramp’s integration with Azure Virtual WAN offers the following key benefits:
- Provides Cisco SD-WAN advanced features by enabling SD-WAN connectivity with the Azure Virtual WAN.
- This feature provides enhanced resilience for the Cisco SD-WAN router that is deployed in the Virtual WAN hub by providing the same resiliency and orchestration features as other native networking services in the Virtual WAN.
- Provides seamless routing between Azure Virtual WAN hub router and Cisco SD-WAN hub router through routing integration and BGP peering.
- The SD-WAN branch can automatically connect to all spoke VNet and non-SD-WAN branches by using automatic any-to-any connectivity.
Customers using Cisco SD-WAN will be able to unlock Cloud Onramp from the vManage panel, giving them the ability to apply the same policy, security, and other SD-WAN policies to all Cisco SD-WAN devices – whether on-premises or in the cloud. Cisco SD-WAN Cloud Onramp, in conjunction with Microsoft vWAN, enables end-to-end automation from branch to cloud connectivity, resulting in a seamless user experience.
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