Guanmai Technology CTO Miao Quan: Steadily enter the SD-WAN market and be prepared to deploy 5G

[51CTO.com original article] From the emergence to the development and then to the market application of new technologies, each stage will face different challenges, and SD-WAN is no exception. From overcoming WAN link costs to integrating applications and combining with multiple clouds, in recent years, SD-WAN has successfully attracted customers with its many advantages such as performance, cost and flexibility, and has also attracted the layout and capital of large and small manufacturers.

Recently, Guanmai Technology CTO Miao Quan accepted an exclusive interview with 51CTO. During the interview, he analyzed the differences between SD-WAN and MPLS-VPN, and used maps and navigation as an analogy to vividly illustrate the advantages of network access solutions built on SD-WAN, as well as the more opportunities that the large-scale use of 5G technology will bring to the development and implementation of SD-WAN.

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Miao Quan, CTO of Guanmai Technology

More than ten years of experience in the network communications industry has helped us seize the opportunities brought by the advent of SD-WAN

SD-WAN represents the most eye-catching application of SDN technology in recent years. It aims to help users reduce wide area network (WAN) expenses and improve network connection flexibility.

The development of cloud computing technology has triggered changes in the IT industry. Internet+ has driven the transformation of traditional industries. More and more companies are beginning to deploy their core businesses on the Internet. SD-WAN services, which focus on the enterprise market and wide area networks, were formed in such an industry context. To some extent, SD-WAN is an application driven by technology, and the continuous evolution of technology has further accelerated the development and implementation of SD-WAN. The advent of VXLAN at the end of 2015 has pushed SD-WAN forward by a big step. Compared with VLAN, VXLAN has the following advantages:

• A 24-bit VNI field value can support a larger number of virtual networks.
• Through tunnel technology, a virtual layer 2 network is created in the physical layer 3 network, and the network terminal cannot detect the communication process.
• It has the feature of multi-tenant support. Through segmentation, each tenant can independently network, communicate, and allocate addresses.

Nowadays, cloud computing has become the norm for enterprises, and many enterprises are still in multi-cloud mode, so a surge in WAN traffic is inevitable. As a result, while improving network performance and upgrading, it is also urgent to ensure the efficiency and experience of cloud-based enterprises. More importantly, there are also operation and maintenance issues that manufacturers, operators and other parties are very concerned about. It is in this context that SD-WAN has its place, and Guanmai Technology has been born to meet the needs.

The reason why we were able to make such an accurate choice and seize the opportunity is due to the continuous cultivation of Guanmai's founding team in the fields of network transmission, communication operation services, etc. Its core team brings together technical experts in the ICT field from Baidu, ChinaCache, Lenovo, etc. Miao Quan is a veteran in this industry. He has served as the technical director of Tsinghua University CDN Distribution Research Institute, ChinaCache Rich Media and Download Division, North American R&D Center, etc. He is the inventor of the network evaluation algorithm and has presided over the development of many core CDN platforms, such as the core cache platform, distributed storage system, and streaming live broadcast. With more than ten years of industry experience and keen insight, when SD-WAN first appeared in the public eye on the other side of the ocean in 2014, he decisively noticed the opportunity. Later, the rapid development and growth of Velocloud in the United States and its acquisition by VMware further confirmed his judgment.

Steadily enter the NaaS market with core technologies and innovative capabilities

"SD-WAN means software-defined wide area network in English. This term is defined from a technical perspective. If we look at it from the perspective of demand, it is more appropriate to call it NaaS, which means network as a service," Miao Quan told the author.

Enterprise customers build virtual machines on the cloud service provider's platform and use these virtual machines as a springboard for acceleration, but the network optimization effect achieved in this way is limited. Companies that can really provide NaaS services need to build a dedicated virtual network on the Internet and make different optimizations from the second-layer data link layer, the third-layer network layer, the fourth-layer transport layer, and the seventh-layer application layer to solve the bottleneck in real-time transmission and meet the needs of global game servers, online real-time interaction, cloud-to-cloud communication, hybrid cloud, mobile office and other scenarios.

AllWAN is a NaaS network service product that was created based on such needs. It combines the stability of private line networks with the economy of the Internet, has a programmable API, and is highly scalable. CP vendors can flexibly activate and quickly deploy globally, truly achieving ready-to-use.

When asked about the specific advantages of NaaS compared to MPLS-VPN, Miao Quan said that the dedicated line business seems to be very close to the Internet, but the MPLS-VPN industry has not changed much in the past 30 years and can be regarded as a traditional industry. Previously, most companies chose the 2.5-layer label technology of the MPLS-VPN network segmentation model for networking. During the implementation process, they encountered many problems, such as long implementation cycle, inflexible expansion, poor delivery form, cumbersome operation and maintenance, and deployment. In addition, this technology requires proprietary equipment to build the network, and the management cost is very high.

In comparison, NaaS is more suitable for the current requirements of dedicated line networks for quality, scalability, and monitoring management. Therefore, Guanmai Technology has built the AgotoZ AllWAN product based on this technology.

The following figure shows the comparison between MPLS and AgotoZ AllWAN.

MPLS-VPN can be compared to an ordinary map, then AllWAN is a map with navigation function. The most notable feature of navigation is that it can be adjusted in real time according to the situation. When a node has a problem, the traffic route can be intelligently and flexibly mobilized to reach the other end in the shortest time. At the same time, acceleration technology is used to synchronize the transmission of related data packets as quickly as possible. In terms of delivery, AllWAN can provide 2/3/4/7 layer delivery, OSI network layer 2 VXLAN, layer 3 dynamic routing, layer 4 TCP/UDP acceleration, and layer 7 data cache, making long-distance and cross-ocean data transmission possible in real time, with delay controlled within 250 milliseconds. Generally speaking, MPLS-VPN can only deliver at layer 3, which is inferior in terms of delay, flexibility, etc.

Miao Quan cited a typical customer case, which is the VIPKID remote teaching scenario: students and teachers are distributed in different countries and cities, and there are millions of classes going on at the same time every night, and teachers and students communicate online one-on-one in real time. Such requirements seem simple, but behind the smooth and delay-free user experience is the support of Guanmai Technology's strong technical capabilities. Such customers must not only cope with large changes in traffic and ensure normal two-way real-time interaction under the premise of global coverage, but also consider the situation where the positions of teachers and students are constantly changing. For VIPKID, AllWAN provides three-layer delivery to fully ensure that when a large number of C-end requests enter the Guanmai network, these traffic can be flexibly mobilized to different exits and then synchronized to different teachers and students. At the same time, the use of traffic scheduling technology takes into account the mobility of teachers and students, and also ensures stable, fast and timely transmission, so that students can hear what the teacher across the ocean says within a quarter of a second. Traffic scheduling technology is very, very complex and can fully reflect the carrying capacity of a network.

As shown in the figure below, the core advantages of AllWAN products

Miao Quan said that currently, it is relatively easy for 2C enterprises to close deals, because the needs are clear and network access solutions can be customized according to the needs. It is slower for 2B enterprises to close deals, and they must really solve the pain points of customers and provide timely assistance. The Internet is essentially the same, that is, it mainly helps customers reduce costs, improve efficiency and enhance the user experience.

Always adhere to the network forward-looking technology research and always be prepared to enter the 5G market

Recently, Guanmai Technology announced the completion of a B+ round of financing of 250 million yuan. Miao Quan said that the funds will be used for network expansion, technology investment, and 5G layout.

In terms of network expansion, Miao Quan mentioned that Guanmai’s goal is to achieve global coverage without blind spots, so that users can enjoy the fast and smooth network access services brought by Guanmai when using the network, regardless of external conditions such as their location, access operator, and their own conditions.

Looking around the world, the 5G era has just begun, and more usage scenarios will be connected. Every major change needs to rely on the change and revolution of the underlying technology, and what Guanmai Technology needs to do now is to lay a solid foundation.

It is reported that Guanmai Technology has established a global technical expert committee in Silicon Valley to provide technical support. The core technical expert members include: Dr. Ken Zhang, former CTO of Ericsson (stock code: ERIC) Greater China and Northeast Asia, former president of ChinaCache Holdings (stock code: CCIH), who serves as the chairman of the technical expert committee; Dr. Jan Uddenfeldt, former global CTO of Ericsson, the main inventor and industry driver of global wireless technology (i.e. GSM and mobile broadband 3G and 4G LTE), who serves as the vice chairman of Guanmai Technology's technical expert committee. In the future, Guanmai Technology's technologies and solutions will gradually integrate cutting-edge technologies such as edge computing and network slicing.

[51CTO original article, please indicate the original author and source as 51CTO.com when reprinting on partner sites]