Enterprise Networking Landscape
Situation:
What is Enterprise Networks? Why is it so important in a company? This article covers this sector analysis and expatiates using the SPIN analysis the importance of investing in this part of the economy.
An enterprise network is the backbone of communications in every company, connecting all their computers and devices thus increasing data accessibility and interoperability amongst various departments in the company. This connectedness eliminates the isolation between member departments irrespective of the devices used. There are startups that major in this part of the economy placing emphasis on the physical and the network layers of connection.
The analysis in this sector shows that the start of the plan is always from the physical devices to the topographical layout of the networks. There are various platforms of operation depending on the diversity of devices and operating systems that are used in the company.
Problem and Implication:
Computing has become easier because of these improvements in connecting devices and networks but there are certain problems faced by the startups or investors in this sector.
They are:
Devices Run Amok: This problem is usually faced in companies that run a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policy. There is usually the risk of running rogue apps and unauthorized software on the company’s network thereby unnecessarily increasing the network performance.
Outdated Hardware: The hardware is the backbone of every network, and there are new updates to the hardware technologies that run most networks. The major drawback of using outdated technologies is sluggish networks thus leading to slow business adaptations.
Security Flops: Since most of the networks are linked, there is a high risk of security vulnerability if proper measures are put in place. Security vulnerabilities not only slow the network down, but more critically, expose it to exploit or attack.
Network Design problems
Need Payoff:
570+ companies in the sector, 153 funded in last 5 years, $857M invested in 2016-17 YTD. NEA, Sequoia Capital, WTI, Intel Capital, LSVP, Accel Partners are the most active investors.
Physical Network Device: Physical Networking Equipment useful in Switching, routing and other network functions. There have been 36 companies founded in the last 7 years with and overall funding amount of $1729M.
There are 5 subsectors here:
Switches & Routers: Networking Vendors providing switches and routing solutions.
Routing Software: Routing protocol software used by wired and wireless networking vendors.
Gateways: A router used to control the flow of packets from external network to internal network.
SDN Switch: Data Plane switching devices in-line with SDN architecture.
DNS: Domain Name Systems used for address resolution and management.
Network Management: Software and hardware products helping in management of networks. There have been 46 companies founded in the last 8 years with an overall funding amount of $818M.
There are 5 subsectors here:
Performance Monitoring: Solutions providing information about performance of the network.
SDN: Network management suitable for SDN environment.
Network Orchestration: Software to handle network and related orchestration services.
Analytics: Analytics solutions for analysis of network health, network visibility, and network visualization.
Mesh Networks: Network Management for wireless mesh networks.
CDN: Content Delivery Network solutions to serve content to end-users with high availability and high performance. There have been 53 companies founded in the past 8 years with an overall funding amount of $1318M.
There are 5 subsector here:
Caching: CDN service using content caching technique.
P2P: CDN service using peer-to-peer network.
Cloud-based: CDN services provided over cloud.
SDN: CDN service using Software defined networking.
Traffic monitoring: Content delivery service using network traffic management.
WLAN Infrastructure: Wireless distribution technologies for enterprises both through a cloud and physical device delivery mechanisms. There have been 12 companies founded in the 2010-2015 business year with an overall funding amount of $593M.
There are 3 subsectors here:
Network management: Network Management solutions for WLAN.
Cloud: Cloud managed software for WLAN infrastructure management.
Mesh Networks: Wireless mesh network solutions for WLAN.
WAN: WAN Optimization providing technologies. There have been 17 companies founded in the last 7 years with an overall funding amount of $616M.
There are 3 subsectors here:
SD-WAN: Software-defined WAN optimization solutions.
Cloud-Delivered: WAN solutions provided through cloud.
WAFS: Wide Area File Service (WAFS) providers.
Some interesting companies are:
SevOne (2005, Wilmington): Network Performance Management. With Bain Capital Ventures, HarbourVest Partners, Osage Venture Partners, Bain Capital, Osage University Partners, Westfield Capital, Osage Marketing, and Brookside Capital investing $202M.
CloudFlare (2009, San Francisco): Security & Performance solutions for website. With
Fidelity Investments, Microsoft Ventures, NEA, Union Square Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures,Baidu, Venrock, Pelion Venture Partners, Greenspring Associates, CapitalG investing $182.1M.
Conclusion:
Every company needs an integrated connection that serves as the backbone for business operations. There are major improvements in the hardware technologies that allows for the efficient running of major sectors in the economy as every organization requires an efficient network.
References:
The WWW
Tracxn Report, April 2017
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