26 01732 759725 NETWORKS Embedded security In traditional networking, security is often treated as an add-on, with firewall appliances bolted on at individual sites and the use of third-party providers for VPNs or secure gateways – all of which needs careful coordination. The convergence of network and security capabilities is at the heart of the SASE model. Bringing NaaS and security-as-a-service into one unified edge architecture enables security policies to be defined centrally and enforced consistently across users, devices, locations and clouds. Firewall-as-a-service, secure web gateways and clientless VPNs can be integrated into a single platform, reducing risk, improving compliance and avoiding the gaps and inconsistencies that come with fragmented, bolt-on security. Unified visibility and control One of the big headaches in traditional networking is fragmented visibility. Each vendor, appliance or service might have its own portal and logs, and correlating data across them to diagnose issues or enforce policies is cumbersome. NaaS centralises monitoring and management into a single pane of glass. IT teams gain real-time, end-to-end visibility over the entire network estate which might span offices, remote users, multiple clouds or partner integrations. SASE extends this visibility to include security and data flows. Having a unified view across both network performance and policy enforcement accelerates troubleshooting as teams can isolate and resolve issues quickly and prove when the network isn’t the root cause. Enhanced user experience Today’s workforce expects seamless, secure access whether they’re at their head office, home, a client site or halfway across the world. Unlike legacy VPNs and network architectures that often Simplified network management Network teams are famously overworked. Too often, strategic improvements get delayed because the operational load of patching, configuring, renewing licences and troubleshooting tickets is overwhelming. While many NaaS models are self-serve, there are providers that offer managed services, meaning that tasks like device configuration, maintenance, upgrades and even security policy enforcement are handled by the service provider. IT teams regain capacity to focus on higher-value work, like improving the user experience or enabling new business services, rather than endlessly managing infrastructure. In a SASE-aligned environment, these management benefits extend beyond networking to include unified policy control across users, devices and data. Improved cost control Networking has historically been a capital expenditure-heavy domain: buying and installing expensive hardware every few years in big, lumpy refresh cycles, with the risk of overprovisioning to handle peak demand, which wastes money, or underprovisioning and risking outages. NaaS shifts networking to an operational expenditure (OpEx), consumption-based model. You pay only for what you use, with the flexibility to scale up or down as needs change. This can improve budget predictability while avoiding the waste of idle capacity. It also means avoiding big up-front costs that strain capital budgets and limit agility. SASE models take this further by consolidating multiple networking and security services into a single subscription. Some financial teams may prefer the predictability of CapEx; others may welcome the flexibility of OpEx. The important point is that NaaS offers choice and can align costs more tightly with actual business need. In a world of relentless digital change, certain parts of the IT estate have felt stubbornly resistant to transformation. While the cloud revolution has made computing power and storage consumption-based, elastic and easy to provision, networking has remained a tangle of legacy infrastructure, expensive refresh cycles and opaque managed service contracts. Enter NaaS. Far more than a buzzword or rebranded oldschool outsourcing, NaaS moves networking firmly into the cloudera service model – flexible, scalable and aligned with real business priorities. Increasingly, it does this as part of a broader Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) framework that integrates networking and security as unified, cloud-delivered services. Here are seven reasons why organisations under pressure to support hybrid work and multi-cloud adoption while enhancing security and cost control should take a closer look at the benefits of NaaS. Strategic agility and scalability Legacy networks can be painfully slow to evolve. Need to open a new branch? Integrate with a partner? Support a growing remote workforce? Traditional network changes can take months and often involve complex procurement cycles, vendor negotiations and site installations. NaaS lets you consume networking on-demand and implement secure connectivity to new sites or cloud workloads in minutes rather than months, scale access seamlessly for hybrid workers and support multi-cloud strategies without re‑architecting from scratch. When delivered as part of a SASE model, this agility extends to consistent security enforcement and access control, enabling rapid, secure expansion without compromising governance. The case for NaaS Networking as a Service (NaaS) is gaining traction, but is it right for every organisation? Cloud Gateway Chief Executive Officer Victor Holmin cuts through the hype to explore its real-world potential Victor Holmin
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