RSA Conference 2023 is almost here. If, like me, you have been trying to build a personal agenda for the event, you will know what a daunting task it is. The RSA Conference program lists 981 sessions covering 122 compelling topics from AI to privacy, disaster recovery, cyber warfare and disinformation campaigns. All very exciting, but vast. And how close are they to today’s security concerns? What will the real hot topics be at RSAC? The ones discussed in the aisles and on the booths? And why?
I work for a company whose network traffic intelligence is embedded in a wide range of cybersecurity and networking products. As such, we have a pretty good feel for where the center of gravity is. Our prediction is that the hot topics of RSAC 2023 will revolve around best practices within, and connections between, the heavyweight triad of cloud-based Security Service Edge (SSE), secure Software-Defined Wide Area Networking (SD-WAN), and Secure Access Service Edge (SASE, i.e., integrated networking and security delivered as a cloud service). They will be accompanied by a large side serving of Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA), which is a cybersecurity conceptual and architectural framework that envelops all three.
A lively tango of specialization and convergence
You might argue that SD-WAN and SSE are simply two sides of the SASE coin, one networking and the other security. But that makes things sound much tidier than they actually are. As our OEM technology is embedded in all three, we can attest that the relationship between them is complex and highly dynamic. And vendors and enterprises alike are still trying to figure out how they best fit together.
On the vendor side, over the past two years, we have seen some SSE providers who were transitioning to SASE pull back and retrain their sights on a best-of-breed cloud security position. We have seen a similar move for SD-WAN, with some re-focusing on best-of-breed SD-WAN, and others setting off on a path to “Secure SD-WAN” by adding a ZTNA framework and Intrusion Detection and Prevention (IDS/IPS), if not Extended Threat Detection and Response (XDR) (which is really less of a pullback from SASE than a slow-walk towards it).
Others remain on a full-steam-ahead path to SASE, or have decided to simply maintain concurrent offers of SASE and SSE or SD-WAN products. And then there are SASE specialists who were born full SASE and intend to stay so.
Whether you are a vendor or an enterprise, navigating this shifting terrain can be tricky. But the good news is, innovation and solid growth continue for all three, ensuring a smoother transition to the cloud and better security for all.
SD-WAN, SASE, SSE: Double digit annual growth & no end in sight
Both analyst research and our internal data confirm that adoption rates and revenue growth remain strong for these three markets. For example, for 2022, Dell’Oro Group [1] a 30% increase in SD-WAN revenue and 38% in SSE. And while revenue for the two was much greater than for unified SASE, the SASE growth rate was far higher. In fact, Dell’Oro [2] predicts SASE revenue will surpass $60 billion between 2022 and 2027 – a five-fold increase, spurred by upside SMB adoption.
Why are these solutions doing so well?
I trace the answer back to a drizzly Thursday evening in March 2020 when I ducked into a café to catch French President Emmanuel Macron’s COVID-19 address to the nation. He announced a closing of the borders and a hard lockdown, with an appeal to employers to let their employees work from home. When the address was over, I grabbed my bag and headed out to catch my commuter train home, where I would join hundreds of millions of others in an impromptu global experiment in remote work.
An accidental experiment, a permanent change
Had COVID-19 struck at an earlier time, the unplanned experiment might have been a failure. But by 2020, adoption of cloud applications and services was already high, and aided by key technologies like video conferencing and home broadband, the experiment was largely a successful one, with productivity actually increasing [3].
Now three quarters of all of companies offer some form of hybrid work [4], including even those who beat the “back to the office” drum [5] the loudest, like Elon Musk, who is now shutting down Twitter’s Seattle and Singapore offices and sending employees back to their home offices. It’s a decision driven by cost-cutting rather than a change of heart about remote work, but the fact that remote work does offer significant savings is just one more proof point that hybrid work – and the cloud-based networking and cybersecurity solutions that sustain it – are here to stay.
Other growth factors: IoT, 5G & Wi-Fi
At the same time as we plunged into serial lockdowns in 2020, the number of connected IoT devices worldwide hit a record 12.2 billion [6], surpassing for the first time non-IoT connected devices (like smartphones, laptops, and computers). Since then, robust growth continues despite barriers like chip shortages and inflation, with an estimated 18% increase in connected IoT devices in 2022, along with record levels of VC and Fortune 500 investments.
This increase in connected IoT devices plus the shift to hybrid work has led to an enduring surge in Wi-Fi demand, which is accelerating the advancement of technologies like Wi-Fi 6 and 6E that can significantly boost Wi-Fi capacity and performance. Wi-Fi 6 is also an ideal partner for IoT-centric private 5G networks, which Analysys Mason anticipates [7] will grow at a compound annual rate (CAGR) of 48 percent in the 2021-2027 period.
Together, these three fast growing technologies – IoT, Wi-Fi and 5G – are enabling a new generation of low-latency, ultra-reliable, and mass-volume applications that are driving digital transformation. And they all depend on distributed edge computing resources that are ideally provisioned and secured within SSE, SD-WAN and SASE frameworks.
Big challenges – and opportunities – for solution vendors
For all these reasons and more, we expect many conversations at RSAC 2023 will be about the evolution of SASE, SSE and secure SD-WAN, how to deploy them and how to manage them. With so much at stake, we also expect a lot of deep dive discussions about the importance of application and service awareness within these solutions, how it shapes their performance and the key functions within them.
If you’re going to RSAC 2023 and want to discuss further, book a meeting with me here. To learn more about the role of application and service awareness in cloud security solutions, see these whitepapers on SASE, SSE and SD-WAN or visit our cybersecurity use case webpage.
Sources:
- [1] www.delloro.com/news/sase-continues-to-roll-with-revenue-up-34-percent-to-top-6-billion-in-2022/
- [2] www.delloro.com/news/ase-market-to-exceed-over-60-b-between-2022-and-2027/
- [3] www.techrepublic.com/article/deloitte-report-finds-employees-more-productive-during-pandemic/
- [4] www.ifebp.org/store/employee-benefits-survey/Pages/default.aspx
- [5] hubblehq.com/blog/famous-companies-workplace-strategies
- [6] www.iotforall.com/state-of-iot-2022
- [7] www.analysysmason.com/research/content/regional-forecasts-/private-5g-networks-forecast-rma17/
