BT has large corporates using SD-WAN service

BT Global Services on Tuesday formally launched is new software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN) service, having already rolled it out to a number of large customers.

The U.K. operator said its new Agile Connect service is based on technology from Nokia's SDN business Nuage Networks.

"Agile Connect equipment is currently live within the networks of several large global organisations and is now ready for volume deployment for existing and new customers," BT said, in a statement.

Amongst other things, Agile Connect is designed to help enterprises manage traffic flows and set up new sites more easily. It uses SDN to determine the best route for traffic to follow across the customer's WAN and enables the customer to prioritise certain applications while de-prioritising others.

"We invest all our efforts in giving customers choice, security, resilience, service, and agility in the rollout of high performance networks that support their digital transformation — what we call Dynamic Network Services," said Maria Grazia Pecorari, president of digital, global portfolio and marketing at BT Global Services.

"Today's announcement is an important stage in the acceleration of that investment," she said.

The Dynamic Network Services programme is the umbrella under which BT is rolling out new network technologies, including SDN and network functions virtualisation.

Agile Connect is delivered as a single box on the edge of the customer's network, BT explained, with further services added as additional devices. In future, Agile Connect will support virtual network functions, with new services deployed virtually to the Agile Connect device, removing the need to install multiple boxes, the telco said.