Fortinet, Cisco Top Gartner SD-WAN Magic Quadrant

Fortinet just topped a list of vendors that provide software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN) solutions.

Research firm Gartner has revealed its popular Magic Quadrant for SD-WAN, rating 11 companies' product features, go-to-market factors and customer experience. Six companies landed in the vaunted "Leaders" quadrant, with Fortinet positioned the highest for the fourth consecutive year.

According to Gartner, Fortinet is working with an estimated 40,000 SD-WAN enterprise clients. Partners praise Fortinet's "robust channels and competitive" pricing, as well as its product road map and customer experience.

Cisco, Broadcom-owned VMware and Palo Alto Networks appeared next highest. Versa Networks and HPE also scored in the Leaders quadrant. Huawei and Juniper finished in the Challengers and Visionaries quadrants, respectively. Then Ericsson's Cradlepoint, Peplink and Barracuda scored in the Niche Players quadrant.

SD-WAN Magic Quadrants members must be deployed with at least 1,200 enterprise customers or 60,000 enterprise sites. Gartner called this report the WAN Edge Infrastructure Magic Quadrant before rebranding it to SD-WAN in 2022.

Single-Vendor Vs. Dual-Vendor

Gartner dinged Fortinet's "limited integrations" with secure access service edge (SSE) vendors can hinder customers' choices for their secure access service edge (SASE) platform. And that point ties into a larger observation the research firm made: Single-vendor SASE might not be as widespread as people think it is.

Related:CF20: 2024's Top SASE Providers You Should Know

Gartner argued in its report that "dual-vendor SASE" represents the primary way businesses are deploying SD-WAN and SSE together. SASE by definition is the combination of networking (i.e. SD-WAN) and cybersecurity features (i.e. SSE) on a cloud-based platform.

"Dual-vendor SASE is more popular in the near term since there is a significant deployment of either existing SD-WAN or SSE. Oftentimes, a different vendor is chosen from the original deployment to complete the solution (adding SD-WAN or SSE when the other is already deployed), since few vendors currently offer complete single-vendor SASE solutions," the report's authors wrote.

That being said, Gartner predicted that 65% of new SD-WAN purchases will come through a single-vendor SASE offering by 2027. That number is currently 20%, Gartner said.

Nirav Shah, Fortinet's vice president of products and solutions, said Fortinet has always operated with the vision of converging SD-WAN and security.

Fortinet's Nirav Shah

"The first thing we hear from customers is, it needs to be simple. You cannot have SD-WAN without built-in advanced security. That's why the convergence of security and SD-WAN remains top of mind for a lot of customers," Shah told Channel Futures. "And that's not only where the market is going, but almost every customer prefers to have a security-driven SD-WAN as they deploy it."

Related:Palo Alto Networks, Cato Networks, Netskope Lead Gartner SASE Magic Quadrant

Shah said that while SD-WAN has become the foundation of most customers' environments, they are eying single-vendor SASE for their "broader architecture vision."

"Customers are saying, 'Can you give me a single-vendor SASE where SD-WAN is on-prem and SSE in the cloud, running the same features, same capability and same management?'" Shah said.

Steve Mockaitis, lead network solutions engineer at C3 Technology Advisors, said customers are expressing "significant interest" in self-managed and fully-managed single-vendor SASE platforms.

C3's Steve Mockaitis

"We are seeing a few of the leading single-vendor SASE providers developing relationships with MSPs to provide a full-service wrapper around their platform. Network teams love how simple it can be to interface and administer these technologies, but often do not have the head count to adequately address the business needs. A managed single-vendor SASE approach can solve these issues," Mockaitis said.

Related:State of Managed SD-WAN, SASE: VMware Portfolio Changes Cast a Heavy Shadow

Service Providers

Many channel partners interact with Fortinet through its service provider partnerships. Technology advisors (agents), for example, source managed SD-WAN offerings from managed network services providers that are buying and leveraging Fortinet.

Shah said those service providers are also in favor of single-vendor SASE.

"It's not really about single-vendor or not, but they want to go in the direction of SASE. They want to give the flexibility to customers on whom they want to choose. But what they like is the simplicity of having those offerings available at a very fast pace, because that helps their business," Shah said. "For a lot of our service providers who have an expertise in SD-WAN, when they realize that our SD-WAN ecosystem – whether they want to go to SASE or SD-branch or specific AI technologies – is all tightly integrated."

Mockaitis said many of C3's managed service provider partners use Fortinet.

"In fact, some of the most recent SD-WAN deployments we’ve helped clients navigate have been on the Fortinet platform. In my experience, Fortinet have a strong presence in the managed SD-WAN market. The platform has a large install base, making it easy to move from a self-managed approach to either a co-managed or fully managed service," Mockaitis told Channel Futures. "Some service providers will also take over management of existing client Fortinet deployments, which allows for clients to be nimble in between hardware refresh cycles."