AT&T Partners with Cisco for SASE, MetTel Launches Global Network

AT&T and MetTel both made significant portfolio changes that give partners new options for selling managed SASE solutions.

AT&T this week deepened its secure access service edge (SASE) portfolio by adding Cisco as a second technology partner. The service, AT&T SASE with Cisco, brings together advanced security features with networking features like SD-WAN. In addition, the managed service customizes the customer’s network on a per-site basis and gives businesses control access for any devices that connect to the network.

Cisco’s Shailaja Shankar

Executives said the solution will help remote and hybrid employees better connect to their applications.

“The shift to remote work has accelerated the need for SASE solutions, so that users and devices are secure anywhere they work,” said Shailaja Shankar, senior vice president and general manager of the Cisco Security Business Group.

AT&T’s Rupesh Chokshi

AT&T announced a SASE partnership with Fortinet earlier this year. However, AT&T Cybersecurity vice president Rupesh Chokshi said AT&T needed to offer customers choices.

“Through our collaboration with Cisco, we’re offering an integrated, modern solution that addresses the connectivity and security demands of a multicloud, network environment while enabling innovation,” Chokshi said.

AT&T and Cisco have deepened their relationship in many ways this year. AT&T announced in June that it would offer up to $1 million customer Cisco Webex calling. A month later AT&T added managed Cisco SD-WAN to its technology portfolio.

MetTel SASE

Meantime, New York-based MetTel launched a global cloud network.

MetTel’s Ed Fox

The company is launching cloud-based communication delivery centers in several different countries. The first 10 will be in Montreal, Toronto, Calgary, Mexico City, London, Madrid, Mumbai, Singapore, Tokyo and Sydney.

Executives said this network will enable MetTel to deliver managed SASE services alongside its ecosystem partners.

MetTel, which earned a reputation for its SD-WAN deployments, is bringing together SD-WAN with zero-trust network access (ZTNA), firewall as a service (FWaaS), secure web gateway (SWG) and cloud access security broker (CASB) onto the same platform.

“MetTel is poised to deliver fully managed SASE services through our U.S. and global cloud centers on demand for enterprise clients, providing benefits such as AI-based threat correlation without the complexity,” said Ed Fox, chief technology officer of MetTel. “There are no easy answers to SASE today because no single technology vendor does it all well. A multivendor approach lets organizations get the best technology at a pace and timing that makes sense for them, and MetTel is here to make sure all of the pieces come together exactly as they are needed without abandoning existing investments — the most logical choice for many organizations.”