Featured Article from SD-WAN Experts

The recent ruling by a federal appeals court to uphold the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC (News - Alert)) Net Neutrality rules has sparked controversy among service providers. The ruling specifically prohibits ISPs from prioritizing certain types of traffic, essentially creating an open, level playing field for the Internet.

While many providers are protesting the decision, some members of the channel partner and master agent communities are in favor of the ruling. These partners believe that net neutrality puts a stop to anti-competitive behaviors while also ensuring the Internet remains open. And the ruling also creates a demand for innovative technologies like software-defined networking (SDN) and virtualization, enabling organizations to better prioritize and manage their own Internet traffic.

"We are glad to see that the Internet will remain open, with equal access for all, at least on the surface," said Patrick Oborn, co-founder of Telarus (News - Alert), a master agent in the telecom space. He added that he believes the ruling will also foster innovation and growth as service providers invest in their infrastructure to keep up with demands for high-quality service.

"Considering that the monthly recurring revenue derived by fiber access is among the most margin-rich in their portfolio, it would reason that carriers will do everything in their power to protect their fiber market share – which means investing in their back-end networks, regardless of what their spokespeople say in front of the news cameras," he added.

Telarus are big proponents of SDN, recently writing about using it in their own networking environment for reduced downtime and auto failover. Oborn referred to the technology as “the great equalizer” if service providers attempt to throttle certain types of traffic, enabling business applications to run smoothly and efficiently regardless of service provider behavior.

"By leveraging SDN, which is now affordable even to smaller businesses, and circuit monitoring technology that can measure and archive [internet provider] performance, small businesses will have the information they need to pick and choose the [providers] that are doing it right," said Oborn.