VMware NSX and Cisco ACI are the early leaders in the nascent software-defined network market mainly because of their positions in the marketplace, writes Wikibon Principal Research Contributor Stuart Miniman in “VMware NSX and Cisco ACI lead the SDN conversation”. Hypervisor market leader VMware vaulted itself into a prominent position in SDN with its 2012 purchase of Nicera, which it used to create NSX, its SDN solution. Cisco, the dominant network switch vendor, has replied with its own solution, the Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI), which does not work with NSX and requires an all-Cisco networking environment, specifically the new Nexus 9000.

ACI, writes Miniman, delivers more value to the application layer, a compelling advantage over VMware, which is working to accomplish the same thing for some time. However, NSX is actually an extension of VMware’s industry-leading hypervisor, allowing the virtualization manager to run both the server and network control environments as one system, which has its own advantages. NSX breaks down the server and network silos in the IT organization; ACI preserves them.

NSX is a gamble for Cisco because the majority of Cisco switches in the enterprise are deployed in VMware environments. That, Miniman writes, will generate pressure from customers for Cisco to “play nice” with VMware. NSX, as an all-software product, is easier and less expensive for customers to try out than ACI, which requires the Nexus 9000 server. It also works across multiple brands of network hardware, providing flexibility that carriers and large enterprises in particular will like. However, network adoption always moves slowly, and these are just opening moves in a long-term game. Cisco is very good at marketing solutions and is likely to keep ahead of needs and desires of a majority of users with a “good enough” solution.

Miniman’s recommendation to CIOs is that they start their discussion of SDI with an understanding of the strengths and gaps of their organization. SDN has the potential to dramatically change the cost equation for deploying and managing the network, but no simple, easily deployed solution has appeared yet. VMware and Cisco should only be the starting point for SDN evaluation.

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