Bytes Software Services

VMware SD-WAN

VMware SD-WAN is a cloud delivered solution ensuring resilient WAN connectivity, allowing consumers to have flexible WAN choices (i.e. broadband, MPLS, and LTE). VMware SD-WAN offers high application performance and availability while lowering networking costs. It can detect the degradations and dynamically remediate over one or multiple WAN links. bss13

Features

  • Centralised management and control
  • Real-time WAN link reporting
  • WAN encryption
  • API based management and control
  • Data traffic segmentation
  • Stateful firewall
  • Virtual LAN termination
  • Network agility
  • Cloud gateway controlled
  • Simplified configuration

Benefits

  • Rapid delivery of WAN services
  • Multiple WAN link connectivity options
  • Zero touch provisioning of WAN edge devices
  • Highly resilient WAN operation
  • User application traffic prioritisation
  • Enforcement of business policies for mission critical applications
  • Improve the quality of voice and video session
  • WAN link bonding to increase available bandwidth
  • Resilient delivery of SaaS application traffic via Gateways
  • Rapid configuration through policy inheritance

Pricing

£454.54 a unit a year

  • Education pricing available

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at tenders@bytes.co.uk. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.

Framework

G-Cloud 13

Service ID

4 9 0 2 9 3 3 4 6 2 1 3 0 1 5

Contact

Bytes Software Services Chris Swani
Telephone: +44 (0) 7951 326815
Email: tenders@bytes.co.uk

Service scope

Service constraints
VMware SD-WAN provides clear guidance regarding the implementation best practises needed for the service. Recommendations should be followed for the deployment of physical appliances to meet the requirements of the site for throughput and overlay tunnel needs. Deployment of virtual appliances should be followed for appropriate resource requirements to meet the through put and tunnel needs.
System requirements
  • Purchased edge devices - Virtual or Physical
  • Software license agreement for each device
  • Compliant hypervisor for virtual edge
  • Resource allocation in the hypervisor for the virtual edge
  • Aligned support agreement for hardware and software as required
  • Internet access and/or private networking
  • Platform selection to meet site's requirement for throughput and tunnel

User support

Email or online ticketing support
Email or online ticketing
Support response times
VMware offers online trouble ticketing through the Customer Connect portalprovided at the VMware website. A response timeline is defined based on thetickets assigned severity level, and the level of support plan purchased:
Basic:Sev1 (<1 hour 24x7), Sev2 (<6 hours 12x5), Sev3 (<12 hours 12x5), Sev4 (12x5)Production: Sev1 (<30 mins 24x7), Sev2 (<4 hours 12x5), Sev3 (<8 hours 12x5),Sev4(<24 hours 12x5) Premier: Sev1 (<30 mins 24x7), Sev2 (<2 hours 24x7),Sev3 (<4 hours 12x5), Sev4(<12 hours 12x5)
User can manage status and priority of support tickets
Yes
Online ticketing support accessibility
None or don’t know
Phone support
Yes
Phone support availability
24 hours, 7 days a week
Web chat support
No
Onsite support
Yes, at extra cost
Support levels
Software support plans are defined as Basic, Production, and Premier. Each support level offers Call Centre support for severity one through four incidents. Basic and Production provide 24x7 severity one support, with the remaining levels being provided at 12x5. Premier improves this by adding severity two with24x7 support.
Hardware replacement services operate a return to base, next business day, 4 hour 9x5, or 4 hour 24x7. Only 4 hour 24x7 will provide local public holiday coverage. Costs available in the pricing document.
Technical Account Managers are part of the VMware service offering, but are funded by the customer unless otherwise agreed.
Support available to third parties
Yes

Onboarding and offboarding

Getting started
VMware Professional Services can rapidly deploy solutions according to the business and technical requirements. This is focused on architecture, topology ,and functional testing. Knowledge transfer sessions are completed to ensure that our customers are fully versed in the operational infrastructure. VMware also partners with organisations that can provide training, deployment, management, and customer-specific documentation for SD-WAN implementations.
VMware has training and classes available with a two-day course that can be delivered privately ,remotely, or in person. Details of the enablement course can be found here:https://mylearn.vmware.com/descriptions/EDU_DATASHEET%20VMware%20SD-WAN%20Deploy%20and%20Manage%204.x.pdf
Service documentation
Yes
Documentation formats
  • HTML
  • PDF
End-of-contract data extraction
All metadata within the Orchestrator remains until the Orchestrator is taken out of service. All backups of the Orchestrator are deleted after one year. VMware Gateways that contain customer metadata are cleared when a log purge event is actioned (either monthly, semi-yearly, or yearly).
Upon explicit request, the data present in the Orchestrator can be deleted at an earlier date.
End-of-contract process
At the termination of a subscription, VMware disables all accounts to prevent access. Edge devices may still send traffic if connected to the network operate with their locally stored configuration. Edges will no longer receive any configuration updates, software support or hardware replacement.

Using the service

Web browser interface
Yes
Using the web interface
VMware Operations create a customer-specific tenant within an SD-WAN Orchestrator. The monitoring, addition, configuration, and deletion of SD-WAN edges are handled through the Orchestrators' web-based service. The administrator creates site profiles that represent the types of edges to be used and the features required. The profile includes information related to the devices interfaces, routing protocols, firewall configuration, and traffic policies.
SD-WAN edge devices are then added to the Orchestrator and mapped to a profile that defines the configured policies. Profiles ensure simple and consistent configuration of the SD-WAN network. SD-WAN Edges are added to the network using Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP) minimising the need for smart hands activity. Any modifications needed on the Edge, i.e. localised addressing and route peering, are centrally handled through SD-WAN Orchestrator.
Users of the SD-WAN Orchestrator service are allocated to roles that control their ability to configure and view. This ensures that only approved users can make configuration changes and modify privileged elements of the SD-WAN network.SD-WAN Orchestrator is available in both cloud-based or on-premises versions. The cloud-hosted version is completely managed by VMware for resiliency, security, and scale. That responsibility falls onto the customer for the on-premise version of Orchestrator.
Web interface accessibility standard
None or don’t know
How the web interface is accessible
N/a
Web interface accessibility testing
VMware has 146 products with ongoing efforts to increase accessibility. VMware has a team of accessibility subject matter experts embedded in the product teams. Over half of our accessibility team has a disability, including five screen reader users and one magnification/keyboard user, and including individuals with cognitive disabilities. VMware also does testing annually with users outside of VMware that have disabilities through the VMware Design Studio program.
API
Yes
What users can and can't do using the API
The VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator can be managed via a Northbound RESTful API via HTTP/TLS1.2. Any action that can be completed through the VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator GUI (monitoring, additions, creation, and deletion) can also be achieved through the API. Many customers and partner integrate their own scripts and delivery tools with the VMware SD-WAN API.
API automation tools
  • Ansible
  • Other
Other API automation tools
  • Postman
  • CURL
API documentation
Yes
API documentation formats
  • HTML
  • Other
Command line interface
Yes
Command line interface compatibility
  • Linux or Unix
  • Windows
  • MacOS
Using the command line interface
VMware SD-WAN provides a secure method to support CLI access to Edges using key pairs generated per user and sends a logged-in user into an Edge CLI shell that only exposes SD-WAN troubleshooting commands and meets CSO requirements.
CLI is available for low-level debugging. VMware recommend utilising SD-WAN Orchestrator or API for provisioning, configuration, and ongoing management and troubleshooting of SD-WAN Edges.

Scaling

Scaling available
Yes
Scaling type
Automatic
Independence of resources
VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator is multi-tenant by design and scales to 15,000 active edge devices. VMware operations team monitor the load and take proactive management. VMware SD-WAN gateways are mapped to customer tenants from pools of resources allocated to an Orchestrator. VMware follows a horizontal stateless scale model, even if an SD-WAN Gateway fails, it re-pins to the next available Gateway (secondary). All VMware Gateways have a stateless architecture; there is no dependency on an earlier failed Gateway for proper functionality. VMware SD-WAN Gateways are continuously monitored by a dedicated cloud operations team responsible for Gateway lifecycle management.
Usage notifications
No

Analytics

Infrastructure or application metrics
Yes
Metrics types
  • CPU
  • Disk
  • Memory
  • Network
  • Number of active instances
Reporting types
  • API access
  • Real-time dashboards

Resellers

Supplier type
Reseller (no extras)
Organisation whose services are being resold
VMWare

Staff security

Staff security clearance
Other security clearance
Government security clearance
None

Asset protection

Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
Yes
Data storage and processing locations
Other locations
User control over data storage and processing locations
Yes
Datacentre security standards
Complies with a recognised standard (for example CSA CCM version 3.0)
Penetration testing frequency
At least every 6 months
Penetration testing approach
Another external penetration testing organisation
Protecting data at rest
  • Physical access control, complying with SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
  • Encryption of all physical media
Data sanitisation process
Yes
Data sanitisation type
  • Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
  • Hardware containing data is completely destroyed
Equipment disposal approach
Complying with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v.30, CAS (Sanitisation) or ISO/IEC 27001

Backup and recovery

Backup and recovery
Yes
What’s backed up
  • VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator database
  • Orchestrator DR as a hot-standby with live feed from primary
  • Extract key configuration and statistics information via API
Backup controls
Backups of the VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator are handled by the VMware operations teams.
Datacentre setup
Multiple datacentres with disaster recovery
Scheduling backups
Supplier controls the whole backup schedule
Backup recovery
Users contact the support team

Data-in-transit protection

Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
  • Private network or public sector network
  • TLS (version 1.2 or above)
  • IPsec or TLS VPN gateway
Data protection within supplier network
  • TLS (version 1.2 or above)
  • IPsec or TLS VPN gateway

Availability and resilience

Guaranteed availability
VMware will use commercially reasonable efforts to ensure that the services are available during a given month equal to the “Availability Commitment” specified as follows:
VMware SD-WAN:99.99%.
VMware Secure Access: 99.90%.
VMware Cloud Web Security: 99.99%.
Availability in a given billing month is calculated according to the following formula:
“Availability” = ([total minutes in a billing month – total minutes Unavailable] / total minutes in a billing month) x 100
Details regarding the Service Level Agreement can be found here:https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/downloads/eula/vmware-nsx-sd-wan-by-velocloud-service-level-agreement.pdf
Approach to resilience
VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator Disaster Recovery (DR) is provided by database replication from the live Orchestrator to a hot-spare at an alternate location. Operations tools monitor the live system and trigger the failover to hot-spare when an offline condition is confirmed. VMware SD-WAN Gateway the solution uses multiple logical gateways to provide high availability service to the edges. Each logical gateway can be scaled horizontally for high availability. VMware SD-WAN Edge operate in a High Availability (HA) configuration leveraging an Ethernet interconnect on the GE1 port of each device. The configuration on the Orchestrator causes the active edge to reserve its GE1 port for an expected HA peer. The HA edges exchanges configuration information, software updates, current traffic flow, and WAN link information so the second unit does not require explicit configuration. During an HA failover event, the failover is triggered to the standby device in a sub-second fashion such that active traffic sessions are maintained.
Outage reporting
The real-time status of the VMware SD-WAN services along with past incidents is publicly available on https://status.vmware-services.io/. This page also provides information on future maintenance. Email alerts from the page can be enabled.

Identity and authentication

User authentication
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google apps)
  • Username or password
Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
The VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator is designed for multi-tenant environments. There are three organisational tiers providing distinct roles for access and visibility for the operator, multiple agents/managed services or channel partners, and multiple end enterprise customer tenants. The Orchestrator utilises a native database to authenticate accounts but can also use an external RADIUS server for this validation. Each tier has its own subset of roles and privileges to properly segment users based on responsibility.
Roles: Operator (Reserved), Superuser, Standard Admin, Customer Support, and Enterprise Read Only
Access restriction testing frequency
At least once a year
Management access authentication
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
  • Username or password
Devices users manage the service through
  • Dedicated device on a government network (for example PSN)
  • Dedicated device over multiple services or networks
  • Any device but through a bastion host (a bastion host is a server that provides access to a private network from an external network such as the internet)
  • Directly from any device which may also be used for normal business (for example web browsing or viewing external email)

Audit information for users

Access to user activity audit information
Users have access to real-time audit information
How long user audit data is stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months
Access to supplier activity audit information
Users have access to real-time audit information
How long supplier audit data is stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months
How long system logs are stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months

Standards and certifications

ISO/IEC 27001 certification
Yes
Who accredited the ISO/IEC 27001
Schellman & Company, LLC
ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation date
14/10/2021
What the ISO/IEC 27001 doesn’t cover
N/a
ISO 28000:2007 certification
No
CSA STAR certification
Yes
CSA STAR accreditation date
25/03/2022
CSA STAR certification level
Level 1: CSA STAR Self-Assessment
What the CSA STAR doesn’t cover
N/a
PCI certification
Yes
Who accredited the PCI DSS certification
360 Advanced, Inc
PCI DSS accreditation date
31/03/2021
What the PCI DSS doesn’t cover
N/a
Cyber essentials
Yes
Cyber essentials plus
Yes
Other security certifications
Yes
Any other security certifications
  • ISO27017 Cloud Service Providers
  • ISO27018 Protection of PII
  • SSAE-16 / SOC2
  • ICSA

Security governance

Named board-level person responsible for service security
Yes
Security governance certified
Yes
Security governance standards
ISO/IEC 27001
Information security policies and processes
VMware SD-WAN has a security team that oversees security features during SDLC and manages ongoing security for our product and service offering. To demonstrate the results of this oversight, VMware SD-WAN has received ISO 27000 (27001,27017, and 27018) certification. VMware SD-WAN’s SOC 2(System and Organization Controls) is designed for service providers storing customer data in the cloud. It requires companies to establish and follow strict information security policies and procedures encompassing the security, availability, processing, integrity, and confidentiality of customer data. For ISO compliance, please go tohttps://www.vmware.com/products/trust-center/certificate.html?family=ISO

Operational security

Configuration and change management standard
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Configuration and change management approach
VMware Configuration Management policy is based on industry best practices. Revisions and exceptions are processed through a documented procedure to help ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of our hosted offering.
- maintains cryptographic keys for required cryptography in the SaaS environment based on standards, procedures, and secure methods.
Change Management is staged on the Orchestrator by creating a copy of the profile undergoing the change. The updated profile is attached to individual Edges to test and roll back as needed. All changes are logged in the Orchestrator event log, indicating who/when enacted the change.
Vulnerability management type
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Vulnerability management approach
VMware analyses identified vulnerability for applicability, adjusting the vulnerability score on mitigating factors determining the final criticality score.
The network layer, application, and internal OS layer vulnerability scans are performed. This includes third-party vulnerability scanning and penetration tests. Vulnerability scans are reviewed annually. After analysing the severity and impact, VMware patches all network, utility, and security equipment. VMware has subscriptions to vendor security and bug-tracking notification services. Critical patches are installed timely. Non-critical patches are applied within reasonable timeframes. Patch testing/rollback procedures are completed with minimal impact. Third-party auditors perform reviews against industry standards, including ISO27001.
Protective monitoring type
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Protective monitoring approach
Security scans against the infrastructure components are completed regularly. If a security breach is detected, affected POPs will first be detached from the management core to isolate the exposure. Local bastion hosts will be spun up to provide out-of-band access to the resources. Once the compromised instance or instances are identified, these will be terminated and rebuilt to restore functionality or service. If a material breach is observed, impacted customers will be notified within five days or in the timeframe as required by local law or other applicable regulations (such as GDPR).
Incident management type
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example, CSA CCM v3.0 or ISO/IEC 27035:2011 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Incident management approach
VMware has pre-defined processes for common events. VMware users who become aware of a security vulnerability in VMware products contact VMware with details of the vulnerability. VMware has established an email address used for reporting a vulnerability security@vmware.com. Incident reports are provided via email and release notes

Secure development

Approach to secure software development best practice
Independent review of processes (for example CESG CPA Build Standard, ISO/IEC 27034, ISO/IEC 27001 or CSA CCM v3.0)

Separation between users

Virtualisation technology used to keep applications and users sharing the same infrastructure apart
No

Energy efficiency

Energy-efficient datacentres
Yes
Description of energy efficient datacentres
VMware SD-WAN typically utilizes AWS datacentres and information about AWS & Sustainability can be found here:https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/sustainability/

Social Value

Fighting climate change

Fighting climate change

Sustainable growth for VMware’s business requires decoupling our company growth
from carbon emissions. To this end, we’ve accelerated our focus on decarbonization
and received third-party validation from the Science Based Target Initiative (SBTi) on
our science-based targets. Since 2018, we have maintained our certified
CarbonNeutral® company status, in accordance with The CarbonNeutral Protocol.
Since 2019, we have sourced 100 percent of our power in our global facilities from
renewable sources, in accordance with RE100 Reporting Guidance.
● VMware’s net zero emissions goal builds on approved science-based targets and
expands the scope of our climate commitments. For us, a net zero goal means
reducing emissions for our entire carbon footprint. We are focused on prioritizing
energy efficiency within our operations through our commitment to green buildings,
working with our suppliers to reduce their emissions, and supporting distributed
workforces through our Future of Work initiative. Through carbon financing, we
support low carbon sustainable development projects that enable carbon avoidance
to offset our remaining emissions. In line with the leading net zero guidance, we are
developing our strategy to include carbon removal projects to address residual
emissions.
● In FY22, we furthered climate transition planning at VMware, guided by Taskforce on
Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) recommendations. As VMware
continues to learn more about climate risks, we can build longer time horizon risks
into our strategy to become even more sustainable and resilient.
Covid-19 recovery

Covid-19 recovery

● Decisive action by VMware during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic led to a company-wide remote workforce, which our customers were able to implement as well through VMware’s Workspace solutions. ● Through VMware’s unique Citizen Philanthropy approach to giving, we empower every VMware employee—wherever they are—to be active, engaged citizens, contributing to what matters most to them in their own communities. Throughout the pandemic, VMware people delivered food to neighbors in need, made masks and donated resources to frontline workers and relief efforts, and helped nonprofit organizations strengthen their IT operations so they can focus on supporting their communities. VMware also supported Global Giving’s Coronavirus Relief Fund and TechSoup’s COVID-19 Response Fund, and raised the limit on matching gifts available to all VMware people.

Pricing

Price
£454.54 a unit a year
Discount for educational organisations
Yes
Free trial available
No

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at tenders@bytes.co.uk. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.