As a challenger in the metro access and aggregation market, Juniper Networks continues to build its footprint among service providers, adding new customers and growing market share. In just over 24 months since announcing our Cloud Metro vision, we’re already seen as an industry leader compared to other vendors that have been in this space for a long time. In a recent survey of metro network operators worldwide conducted by Heavy Reading, Juniper ranked second when respondents were asked, “Which vendors do you perceive as the leading vendors for metro networking?”. Thanks to the groundbreaking vision we’ve laid out for the Cloud Metro and our commitment to delivering solutions that address customers’ most urgent requirements in this domain, more than half of operators surveyed now view Juniper as one of the top vendors shaping the future of metro networks.
Why is Juniper’s Cloud Metro vision resonating with network operators? How have we been able to leapfrog vendors who’ve been working in this space for years? Let’s take a closer look.
Inside the Survey
This June, Heavy Reading conducted an in-depth survey of 84 metro network operators representing multiple types and sizes of providers across five continents. The goal was to understand what operators are seeing in terms of traffic patterns and trends, how they’re seeking to modernize their metro networks and the outcomes they expect.
To no surprise, 51% of operators are concerned, first and foremost, with keeping up with explosive traffic growth. Half of respondents anticipate 10-24% annual metro growth, and another 37% expect 25% or higher. Indeed, meeting traffic requirements remains the top business driver for modernizing the metro.
Tellingly, however, customers have other concerns that are just as important to them as adding capacity. Improving resiliency and security, reducing total cost of ownership (TCO), sustainability and meeting new 5G and edge cloud requirements were all top of mind. In fact, among key use cases driving metro network modernization, supporting new 5G and edge/cloud services far outstripped other concerns.
When Heavy Reading asked survey respondents to rank the most important metro network capabilities, high-speed transport (56%) ranked the third most important. Improving security (64%) and supporting 5G network slicing (57%) were both higher priorities, and service assurance (50%) and automation (48%) weren’t far behind.
Clearly, network operators have a broad range of concerns for metro modernization that extends well beyond the speeds and feeds of individual boxes. So, it shouldn’t be surprising that more and more, and as shown in the Heavy Reading survey, that they find Juniper’s vision for the Cloud Metro so compelling.
Juniper Cloud Metro Keeps Picking Up Steam
Why does Juniper’s Cloud Metro keep getting such an enthusiastic reception from service providers? Because we share their vision of where metro networks need to go. For operators, the future of the metro isn’t about just deploying faster hardware; it’s about fundamentally transforming their approach to metro networks. Service providers want a metro that can address their broader business requirements—requirements that get more complicated and expensive to manage every day.
Juniper understands that providing high-capacity systems is just the starting point. We continue to deliver metro solutions that provide performance and scale better than anyone else in the industry, but we also prioritize:
- Sustainability: The ACX7000 family of Cloud Metro routers are designed from the ground up for environmental and economic sustainability. For example, according to a ACG Research study, the ACX7509 provide system longevity 4-7 years longer than other vendor solutions on the market, reducing e-waste and delivering lower energy consumption by up to 77%, with a future-proof system design and adaptive power innovations.
- Automation: In the Heavy Reading survey, 93% said it takes longer than an hour to deploy metro devices today and nearly a third (31%) take days or longer to deploy. Juniper’s Cloud Metro features more comprehensive, easy-to-use automation than anyone else. Our use case-driven Paragon Automation solution helps operators onboard new metro devices in minutes.
- Assurance: Every ACX7000 platform features embedded active assurance test agents, turning the network itself into an experience sensor. Cloud Metro solutions also feature AIOps intelligence to simplify and accelerate troubleshooting and remediation. These tools cut metro network incident resolution times in half. In many cases, operators can fix issues before customers even realize there’s a problem.
- Security: Our Cloud Metro solution implements Zero Trust security principles throughout the entire IP services fabric. Each ACX7000 platform features a unique cryptographically bounded device identity using the Trusted Platform Module 2.0 (TPM) chip. As soon as a device boots, customers can easily verify if it’s an authentic Juniper hardware and know that its software hasn’t been tampered with.
Add it all up, and you can see why service providers believe Juniper’s Cloud Metro offers a more comprehensive, transformative solution for modernizing metro networks than anyone else. Plenty of vendors offer platforms that provide good capacity and performance to meet traditional metro requirements. Only Juniper can provide all of the following with our Cloud Metro solution:
- Predefined automation use cases that reduce metro equipment onboarding from days to minutes, while increasing automation deployment success rate as compared to DIY approaches
- Active assurance sensors embedded directly in metro routers instead of requiring bolt-on solutions
- Built-in Zero Trust security—protecting the hardware and software from supply chain attacks
- Industry-leading sustainability with products that last longer and consume less power, reducing both CapEx and OpEx
Some vendors can address one or two of these requirements in some parts of their metro portfolio or have announced an intention to do so. Only Juniper combines all of them in a comprehensive package that operators can deploy and benefit from today with our Cloud Metro solution.
Looking Ahead
We’re not surprised that our vision for metro networks is resonating with operators around the globe. After all, we built our Cloud Metro strategy based on extensive research and conversations with operators, developing new approaches to address their most difficult business and technical challenges. Nevertheless, we’re thrilled to see such an enthusiastic reaction from customers in the overall perception of Juniper in the metro space. The market data continues to validate that we’re on the right path. And we’re just getting started.
For more information, visit the Juniper Cloud Metro solution page.
