The new normal: How flexible consumption and NaaS will enable business recovery and advance the Intelligent Edge
JUNE 23, 2020 • BLOG POST • KEERTI MELKOTE, PRESIDENT, INTELLIGENT EDGE FOR HPE AND FOUNDER OF ARUBA NETWORKS
IN THIS ARTICLE
- Flexible consumption, more than ever, has become a key consideration for our customers
- Aruba makes it easy for customers to deploy new network technologies that can aid in business recovery while preparing their network foundation to capitalize on business opportunities at the Edge
Keerti Melkote shares his insights on NaaS as a strategic business enabler
In the past few months my conversations with customers have centered around a common theme: as the world grapples with the worst health and economic crisis in the past hundred years, we envision what our new normal will look like. How to make sure we are set up for business continuity while turning an eye to recovery. How to put technologies in place to keep our employees safe in the workplace. And how flexible consumption models can get our customers started as they navigate our new reality.
Today, we are tackling the consumption piece by introducing our Network as a Service (NaaS) offering, Aruba Managed Connectivity Services. Flexible consumption, more than ever, has become a key consideration for our customers because it gives them IT efficiencies with network operations and financial choice at a time when their resources are tighter than ever. We can make it easier and faster for our customers to deploy new network technologies that can aid in business recovery while preparing their network foundation to capitalize on business opportunities at the Edge.
We are now entering an era of data analytics driven by IoT, AI and automation supported by compute and modern networking to power a new category of applications and workloads that work in concert with the cloud, but operate at the Edge. To deliver customers the networking foundation needed for this next major transition, we recently announced Aruba ESP (Edge Services Platform), the industry’s first platform specifically designed to automate and protect the Edge. In conjunction with Aruba Managed Connectivity Services, we provide customers a complete NaaS experience with consumption for any and all parts of Aruba ESP including network connectivity, services and data analytics. To this, we’ve added service intelligence and proactive service workflow automation. This allows our customers to focus their time where it matters most, and gain unprecedented efficiencies in network operations.
Providing cloud-like flexibility at the Edge is our fundamental goal. In this short video you can see how we deliver on this promise with NaaS and Aruba ESP for our customers. Since customer choice is critical, we provide three consumption models for Aruba ESP: Our customers have the flexibility to consume the new Aruba ESP architectural platform in the cloud as a service, on-premises as a service (private cloud) or as a managed service offering (NaaS) through Aruba’s partners or through Aruba Managed Connectivity Services, one of the new offerings under HPE GreenLake.
Our customers, such as Texas A&M, have embraced Aruba Managed Connectivity Services, which gave the IT efficiencies and financial flexibility that they needed to re-envision technology learning for their students. We are excited to see where they take us now that NaaS provides Texas A&M with the flexibility to grow when they need and at the pace they require.
I will be discussing these topics at HPE Discover Virtual Experience, HPE’s free event for our community of customers, partners, and networking influencers, so you can dive deeper with us there.