Dependingonthe publications you favor or industry news sites you frequent, Software Defined Wide Area Networks (SD-WANs) are either the next best thing on the network horizon, or a tech innovation that still needs to be met with just a hint of skepticism. Regardless of your stance, the question on most people's mind is can this emerging technology deliver the benefits it promises?

Answering this question is critical.  Today's WANs are becoming increasingly complex and in turn, difficult to manage.  And SD-WANs are garnering more headlines as organizations begin to turn to them for maximizing bandwidthwithout completely overhauling their networks. But just like any tech advancement, CIOs are cautious, still wondering if SD-WANs are indeed  ready for "prime time" and can be implemented withoutbeing difficult to manage and more importantly, not increasing the bottom line.

Many organizations are struggling to find their sweet spot when it comes to rapidly responding to new business opportunities, optimizing user experiences and controlling costs. This has become even more of a challenge with the proliferation of mobile devices, wide-spread adoption of cloud-based services and increasing use of high-bandwidth applications.

Debate and dialogue about SD-WANs have become very widespread. So much so,  we recently hosted a live webinar, Software-Defined WAN: A Real-World Success Story, to share a real-life example of an outstanding SD-WAN launch.

During this webinar, Claire Rutkowski and Andy Kimura, Executives at MWH Global; Jeff Gray, Chief Executive Officer of Glue Networks; and Robby Boyd, host of our TechWiseTV, explored how MWH Global used Glue Networks' Gluware, a cloud-based multi-tenant SD-WAN platform. With Gluware, the global engineering and construction management firm increased their bandwidth tenfold -without increasing costs.

What MWH Global achieved using Gluware is an extremely encouraging example of SD-WANs fulfilling the expectations they promised the market. Yet, there are still many questions and "hype" to sort through.

During an upcoming#CiscoChat on Wednesday,August 5 from 10 to 11 a.m., PST, Cisco Product Manager Pedro Leonardo will engage directly with teams from both MWH Global and GlueNetworks to dive deeper into their successful partnership and best practices for implementing SD-WAN solutions.

During this chat, MWH Global Technical Innovation Director Andy Kimura and Glue Networks' Vice President of Sales and Business Development Nate Chessin will outline how organizations can implement SD-WAN solutions without costly upgrades or having to replace existing network infrastructures. Optimizing bandwidth usage, reducing network complexity and boosting business agility will also be a part of the discussion.

Has your organization launched an SD-WAN? Or are you still on the fence and need more insight?  Join the conversation onWednesday, August 5 from 10 to 11 a.m., PSTusing the hashtag#CiscoChat.

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