Aruba advances its AIOps capabilities

Aruba introduced new AIOps capabilities for its Aruba ESP (Edge Services Platform) aimed at reducing the time spent on manual tasks such as network troubleshooting, performance tuning, and Zero Trust/SASE security enforcement. 

Aruba said AIOps, which it has been developing since 2013, is now being used not just network troubleshooting but also performance optimization and critical security controls.

The new capabilities are powered by Aruba’s massive data lake, which continuously and anonymously collects and analyzes device, user, and location data from over 120,000 Aruba Central customers, from more than 2 million network devices and 200 million clients per day. Aruba’s AI is trained by the high volume and wide variety of network and client data. 

“For AI results that customers can trust, the key ingredient is not a mathematical model, but access to a large volume and variety of data to train the models to produce reliable results across all network topologies. Without that foundation, so-called “AI” is nothing more than demoware,” said Larry Lunetta, vice president of portfolio solutions marketing at Aruba. “Fueled by our data lake, our AIOps solutions help enterprises reduce trouble tickets by up to 75 percent while optimizing their network performance by 25 percent or more.”

The new AI-powered IT efficiency features include:

• Aruba Client Insights: Automatically identifies each endpoint connecting to the network with up to 99% accuracy, which is especially important as increasing numbers of IoT devices are added to networks, sometimes without approval from IT. This allows organizations to better understand what’s on their networks, automate access privileges, and monitor the behavior of each client’s traffic flows to more rapidly spot attacks and take action.
• AI-powered Firmware Recommender: Provides IT teams with the best version of firmware to run for the wireless access points in their environments – regardless of model numbers. This greatly reduces support calls and guesswork that network admins face, and helps ensure new features and fixes are implemented more quickly.
• AI Search in Spanish: The same built-in natural language search function in Aruba Central shows its versatility by now supporting queries and responses in Spanish to satisfy the needs of our second largest geographical user community.
• Automated Infrastructure Predictions: Leverages Aruba’s AI Assist feature and Aruba Support outreach to recognize possible hardware and software infrastructure issues for preemptive engagement that can consist of firmware upgrades or recommended hardware replacement.

https://news.arubanetworks.com/news-release-details/2022/Aruba-Helps-Network-Teams-Overcome-Scarce-Staff-Resources-with-First-AIOps-Solution-that-Combines-Network-and-Security-Insights-for-Improved-IT-Efficiency/default.aspx

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Video: Tipping point for A.I. in managing networks?

Eventually all networks will be fully managed by artificial intelligence, but that's not the current reality -- humans are running the show.

How close are we to the tipping point where A.I. can be trusted to make critical decisions for network operations? And what will it take to earn our trust?

Here is a perspective from Larry Lunetta, VP WLAN & Security Marketing at Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company.

https://youtu.be/ozNa0FpJQHw

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Cisco tunes its predictive analytics engine

Cisco is bringing together new predictive technologies with its broad portfolio of observability, visibility and intelligence technologies to improve reliability and performance across all operational scenarios. 

The idea is to offer a predictive analytics engine that leverages telemetry data with predictive models developed with customers across a variety of industry segments to predict user experience issues, providing problem solving options. 

“The future of connectivity will rely on self-healing networks that can learn, predict and plan,” said Chuck Robbins, Chair and CEO, Cisco. “Our research for predictive networks has been tested and developed with customers, and early adopters are seeing major benefits saving them time and money. The industry has been waiting for secure, proactive networking and only Cisco can do it right.”

https://www.cisco.com/c/m/en_us/solutions/predictive-networks/index.html

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Reducing time to root cause detection

https://youtu.be/OhAYsa45eD8

At the ONUG Spring 2022 event, a key topic of discussion was the critical staff shortages faced by IT departments. Optimizing network operations has become a priority. 

 John Heinz, Director of Sales Engineering at Augtera, discusses how machine learning and automation can reduce time to root cause detection and thus help alleviate the staffing shortage.

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Selector raises $28 million for its AIOps

Selector, a start-up based in Santa Clara, California, announced $28 million in Series A funding for its network-aware AIOps, observability and analytics for multi-cloud environments.

Selector Analytics provides hyper speed-to-value for operations with usable AIOps and zero-touch analytics across any and all data. 

The company was founded in 2019 by former Juniper Networks executives, Kannan Kothandaraman and Nitin Kumar. 

The funding round was led by Two Bear Capital, SineWave Ventures, and Atlantic Bridge. Comcast Ventures and Azure Capital Partners are also investors in the company. This brings total fundng to $33M. 

“At Selector, we have assembled a world-class team looking to transform the AIOps space. By merging networking, AIOps, and observability into a single platform, Selector is approaching the space uniquely. Our mission is to eliminate downtime and empower operations with tools to be more efficient and productive in their jobs,” said Kannan Kothandaraman, Co-Founder and CEO, Selector. “Our customers are having amazing success with the platform and are expanding to new problems they once thought unsolvable.”

“Existing monitoring solutions are single-domain, manual, and complex, making rapid event correlation and analysis tedious, frustrating, and often impossible,” said Nitin Kumar, Co-Founder and CTO of Selector. “Selector abstracts all of that complexity and enables automated remediation using elastic data ingestion, declarative transformations, and data-centric machine learning.”

http://www.selector.ai 

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Juniper advances AI and data driven networking

In its virtual Global Analyst, Influencer & Media Summit Day event on Tuesday, Juniper Networks emphasized the role of artificial intelligence for delivering holistic visibility and insights across its entire Junos portfolio. The idea is to leverage data to deliver Experience-First Networking.

Juniper CEO Rami Rahim:

“The last two decades of networking, as I reflect on it, have been about speeds and feeds, performance, scale, throughput, and don't get me wrong these are all really important. But they also become table stakes. The future of IT, the future of networking is about experience, and more specifically something at Juniper that we call Experience-First Networking.”

 “Our Experience-First Networking is our True North. It's our calling at Juniper. How do we achieve it? Well, it starts with harnessing that most precious resource in the world. By now it should be obvious: data. If we leverage data correctly, we can achieve some very powerful flywheel effects across all of our solutions. That's exactly what we have set up to achieve.”

As a cornerstone of its experience-first networking vision, the company is offering Juniper Support Insights, an AI-driven stack to simplify connecting Junos-based customer platforms (ACX Series, EX Series, MX Series, PTX Series, QFX Series and SRX Series) to the Juniper cloud. Data can then be quickly collected, correlated with Juniper-specific knowledge (known defects, contract status, End of Life/End of Support (EOL/EOS), product knowledge bases, security vulnerabilities) and then curated into actionable insights. 

Juniper Support Insights includes access to a secure portal used to manage device onboarding and discovery, as well as a view into operational dashboards and reports. The dashboard provides a summary of holistic operational health metrics and insights for the entire network. Standard reports include detailed analysis into areas such as hardware and software inventory (chassis level all the way to transceivers and all serialized components, logical/physical interfaces, OS versions), exposure covering EOL/EOS and much more. Enhanced custom reports are also available via the Juniper Advanced Care services team.

“The use of data and automation are redefining how customer experience is delivered. Juniper Support Insights represents a major step forward in how we’re transforming services with a focus on personalized, proactive and predictive experience leveraging AI and cloud,” said Derrell James, EVP of Juniper Global Services. “With a new level of end-to-end visibility and actionable intelligence, Juniper is making it easier for service providers, enterprises and partners to optimize the operation of their networks.”

https://blogs.juniper.net/en-us/driven-by-experience/juniper-support-insights-transforming-network-operations-with-ai-driven-support

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Juniper integrates Mist AI with SD-WAN and Secure Branch Gateway

Less than 2 months after completing its acquisition of 128 Technology, Juniper announced several new products integrate 128 Technology and further its vision of end-to-end AI-driven automation, insights and actions from client-to-cloud. The releases combine Mist AI with 128 Technology’s Session Smart SD-WAN technology to deliver integrated AIOps, security and troubleshooting across the WLAN, LAN and WAN. 

The latest additions to Juniper’s AI-driven enterprise include:

• WAN Assurance and Marvis™ Virtual Network Assistant (VNA) for Session Smart SD-WAN. Ingesting telemetry data from Session Smart Routers into the Mist AI engine enables customers to set, monitor and enforce service levels across the WAN, proactively detect anomalies and gain enhanced insight into WAN conditions to assure optimal user experiences.
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• Enhanced SRX operations driven by Mist AI. The SRX Series of secure branch gateways can now be onboarded and configured using Mist AI and the cloud. With zero touch provisioning (ZTP) and automated workflows, Juniper simplifies deployment of these devices.
• New EX4400 secure access switch. The latest addition to the EX Series portfolio is optimized for the cloud with best-in-class security and AIOps.

“Juniper is consistently recognized for our experience-first approach to networking, where AI-driven automation, insight and actions simplify operator experiences and optimize end-user experiences from client-to-cloud,” said Jeff Aaron, VP Enterprise Product Marketing. “These latest product enhancements underscore our sustained commitment to executing on this vision, as well as our unique ability to rapidly deliver new solutions that drive real value to both customers and partners.”

https://newsroom.juniper.net/news/news-details/2021/Juniper-Networks-Combines-Mist-AI-with-Session-Smart-SD-WAN-and-SRX-Secure-Branch-Gateway-for-Optimal-User-Experiences-from-Client-to-Cloud/default.asp

 Juniper to Acquire 128 Technology - focus on AI-driven WANs

Monday, October 19, 2020    

Juniper Networks agreed to acquire 128 Technology, a software-based networking company based in Burlington, Mass., for $450 million in cash and the assumption of outstanding equity awards. Juniper has also coordinated for 128 Technology to issue retention focused restricted stock units, which will be assumed by Juniper.

128 Technology’s session-smart networking enables enterprise customers and service providers to create a user experience-centric fabric for WAN connectivity. Routing decisions are based on real-time user sessions and agile business policies instead of static network policies configured on a per tunnel basis. The company, which was founded in 2014 and launched in 2016,  is headed by Andy Orly, co-founder and CEO.

 Juniper said the deal will enhance its AI-driven enterprise network portfolio by uniting 128 Technology’s Session Smart networking with Juniper’s campus and branch solutions driven by Mist AI. 128 Technology will be integrated with Juniper’s AI-Driven Enterprise business unit, which includes wired and wireless access and SD-WAN, all driven by Mist AI. The combined portfolio will give customers a unified platform for optimized user experiences from client-to-cloud.

“The acquisition of 128 Technology will enable Juniper to accelerate in a key area where we are seeing enormous success – the AI-driven enterprise,” said Rami Rahim, CEO of Juniper Networks. “Both companies share a common vision of putting user experiences above all else and leveraging automation with proactive actions to simplify IT operations. With 128 Technology, we are adding a highly differentiated technology into our award-winning arsenal of campus and branch solutions driven by Mist AI to deliver even more customer value while further accelerating Juniper’s continued growth in the enterprise.”

“128 Technology has brought to market a groundbreaking session-based routing solution that gives rise to experience-based networking. This allows our customers to realign their network with the requirements of a digital future that includes cloud, mobility and virtualization,” said Andy Ory, Co-Founder and CEO of 128 Technology. “The combination of our Session Smart Router with Juniper’s AI-driven enterprise portfolio, expansive channel and world-class support will dramatically accelerate our vision to transform networking and make a big impact on a very large, yet still highly under-served, WAN-Edge market.”

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