Colt Technology Services has today announced the bolstering of its SD WAN proposition, creating the SD WAN 2.0 experience. This development recognises the evolution of the market for managed WAN services, as well as the constant changes in requirements for today’s enterprises. Businesses today need to drive digital transformation through unexpected change, and now require a SD WAN solution that goes beyond simply optimising transport across a network underlay.

SD WAN 2.0 introduces a series of enhancements that align SD WAN to customers’ evolving network landscape. Looking beyond the pandemic, companies will need a long-term solution to address the needs of their growing remote workforce, including optimisation of cloud applications, securing the dynamic network edge, comprehensive insight of network activity, and the ability to scale quickly and efficiently.

As part of the SD WAN 2.0 experience, Colt is launching transformative new features to address these requirements; the WAN optimisation suite, advanced firewall enhancement, enhanced network insights, and an optional Self-Install CPE capability.

The WAN optimisation suite employs packet cloning and Forward Error Correction (FEC) techniques to enable end-users to experience improved quality and speed of mission-critical applications across their network.

Colt’s enhanced security at the network edge (SASE) offers 3-tier security across a customer’s WAN, LAN, and DMZ and is capable of supporting integrated Dynamic NAT and DDoS protection.

Its new advanced analytics platform, powered by Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AI/ML), empowers customers with greater depth and granularity in network reporting.

Colt’s Self-Install CPE feature offers an option for customers to enable Colt’s SD WAN service safely and rapidly with cost savings when compared with third-party installation in non-Colt countries.

Since its launch in 2016, Colt SD WAN has led the way in innovation in managed WAN services. Combining the scale and reach of the Colt IQ Network with an expansive set of features, Colt has created a market-leading solution, enabling customers to accelerate their digital transformation and embrace change, with Colt SD WAN 2.0 being a continuation of this journey.

Colt’s Vice President Product Portfolio, Peter Coppens said: “Colt has been investing in SD WAN for the past few years, and we have seen the technology become a true enabler for the way enterprises do business. When we first launched Colt SD WAN, we weren’t to know it was going to assist organisations through such a large and rapid transformation this year. We are excited to continue to build on our award-winning SD WAN offering with SD WAN 2.0 because we know this new suite of features will enable customers to accelerate their business evolutions through enhanced user experience, powerful analytics, and end-to-end security.”

These new features follow other SD WAN announcements made by Colt this year, including the launch of SD WAN Multi-Cloud which enables customers to leverage a single connection to reach multiple Cloud Service Providers over SD WAN. Colt also launched VoIP optimisation and support for IPv6 – underpinned by SD WAN.

Colt was also recently named as a Strong Performer in The Forrester Wave™: Software-Defined WAN Services, Q4 2020.

Colt’s new additional SD WAN features are available from today.