A Secure SD-WAN for Hybrid Cloud Challenges

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Co-Authored by: Nitish Tiwari, Product Management - Palo Alto Networks and Saptarshi Biswas, Director Nutanix Ready - Nutanix

A New Way to WAN for Hybrid Multicloud Environments

Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS SD-WAN with Nutanix AHV

Digital transformation can drive sweeping benefits for cost-savings, scalability and ease of management while helping organizations achieve unprecedented agility to adapt to rapidly evolving market needs.

But the push to realize these benefits can lead to overly complex wide area network (WAN) architectures that risk security gaps, cause latency that hampers the user experience, and ultimately compromise the very agility promised by the cloud.

Organizations need a smarter approach to network management that can be tailored to the multifaceted requirements of diverse virtualization and branch office applications. This blog explores how Nutanix works with Palo Alto Networks Panorama® Software-Defined WAN (PAN-OS® SD-WAN) to provide a solution.

The existing Nutanix integrations with Palo Alto Networks already help customers secure and enhance virtual networks through Nutanix Flow security microsegmentation and Palo Alto Networks VM-Series Firewalls, infusing segments and microsegments with threat prevention and intelligence.

Our latest validated integration for software-defined networking now helps to improve performance for virtualization and branch office applications in today’s hybrid multicloud environments.

The Limits of Traditional WAN Architectures for Distributed Hybrid Multicloud Environments 

More and more organizations are adopting cloud-based applications and services to drive cost savings, greater operational flexibility, and scalability. However, traditional WAN architectures risk limiting the performance and efficiency of the cloud for remote sites and branch offices.

For example, traffic must still be routed back to a central datacenter, to the public cloud and back. Traditional MPLS connections limit bandwidth and potentially introduce latency and performance issues that constitute a true barrier to long-term cloud adoption. These issues pose a particular performance threat to real-time applications like VDI.

Concurrently, the proliferation of cloud vendors drives new complexity for network security. Lack of unified control over multiple isolated clouds can lead to divergent, siloed security approaches and ultimately increase the risk of serious vulnerabilities. These challenges fuel the need for a more modern approach to networking operations and infrastructure. 

Simplified Networking with a Software-Defined WAN

A software-defined WAN allows for the integration of multiple public and private cloud services  built for today’s hybrid multicloud world and improved application usability.  

PAN-OS SD-WAN simplifies, automates and enhances some of the most critical network management, optimization and security workflows, including:

• Dynamic routing to optimize network performance.
• Traffic optimization to minimize latency and efficiently prioritize bandwidth.
• Application-aware security that enforces policies based on application type, content and users rather than just IP addresses.

This integrated joint solution offers easy zero-touch provisioning from your Palo Alto Networks VM-Series virtual firewall. Palo Alto Networks Panorama streamlines the management and monitoring of PAN-OS SD-WAN deployments, providing centralized control, visibility and policy enforcement across distributed branch offices. Integration with VM-Series firewalls extends advanced threat intelligence and detection abilities to distributed locations and hybrid multicloud environments.

Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS SD-WAN with Nutanix AHV hypervisor delivers a comprehensive solution that combines these advanced networking capabilities with powerful virtualization infrastructure to simplify management and strengthen security.

The Nutanix AHV hypervisor consolidates compute, storage, virtualization, and networking resources to improve system performance and simplify management. This integration enables scalability, cost efficiency and high availability while reducing costs and ensuring continuous service availability.

How It Works

PAN-OS SD-WAN is implemented on top of the Nutanix AHV hypervisor, where it dynamically routes traffic based on real-time path quality metrics such as latency, jitter and packet loss. It establishes secure, optimized connections by creating overlay IPsec tunnels and uses intelligent path selection to help ensure the most efficient route for each application.

On the Nutanix AHV side, the hypervisor provides a robust virtualization layer that consolidates compute, storage and networking resources into one unified platform. The integration with PAN-OS SD-WAN allows smooth traffic management and security enforcement. Policies configured in Palo Alto Networks Panorama extend to your virtualized environments.

An Integrated Vision for Virtualization Management, Networking and Security

Nutanix AHV delivers virtualization capabilities to any workload as well as security and application mobility in one integrated package. These benefits are a natural fit for PAN-OS SD-WAN’s dynamic, flexible approach to distributed networking. Our validated joint solution makes it easy to achieve tangible performance benefits while ensuring robust security controls that mitigate risk.

Nutanix AHV works with PAN-OS SD-WAN to drive consistently high performance, minimal latency and powerful open-source virtualization capabilities. This integrated solution is tailor-made for simplifying management while providing the capabilities needed to tackle IT challenges, including:

1. Edge and branch networking scenarios, where complex hardware-software arrangements across multiple branch sites can create management headaches while inflating overhead.
   
   By consolidating compute, storage and virtualization, Nutanix AHV dramatically simplifies the required technology stack at branch offices. PAN-OS SD-WAN intelligently steers traffic while optimizing WAN connectivity, improving application performance and simplifying IT management.
   
   
2. Real-time VDI applications, where performance hiccups or latency for inefficient legacy WAN architectures can directly hinder the user experience.
   
   By prioritizing real-time VDI traffic, PAN-OS SD-WAN offers a smooth user experience – even across suboptimal WAN links – while Nutanix AHV provides an efficient desktop virtualization platform that scales with changing business needs.
   
   
3. Intelligently steer and prioritize applications using real-time performance metrics and business priorities. This approach ensures that time-sensitive, business-critical applications like VOIP and unified communications receive the necessary bandwidth to minimize latency across datacenter and branch locations.

Learn More About Simplified, Software-Defined Networking

Check out the solution brief to learn more about how PAN-OS SD-WAN integrates with Nutanix AHV.

If you are ready for a more in-depth exploration of this solution, our configuration guide is a great place to get started. 

If you have any questions, we invite you to reach out to your local sales representative to learn more.

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