Cisco SD-WAN: The Right Tool for Keeping Fleets Moving

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Contributing Author: Kamden Schewitz, Product Marketing Specialist

When folks consider fleets, they usually consider a group of ships cruising throughout the ocean. Modern-day fleets, nonetheless, embrace public transportation, first responders, and repair vehicles for utilities, ISPs, and tools or equipment restore. Gone are the times when fleet actions have been solely managed by two-way radio voice communication from a dispatcher.  In the final 20 years, fleets have been reinvented to digitally join over vast space networks (WANs) whereas on the transfer and sending and receiving essential data in real-time enabling them to function effectively and reliably.  Modern fleets share the necessity for dependable and out there communications, safety, and visibility.

Communication, Reliability, and Visibility

Whether we’re speaking about public transportation shifting hundreds of residents throughout the town, first responders racing to the scene of an accident, or service fleets responding to energy outages – fleet deployments have a definitive want for safe, dependable community connectivity with excessive availability that may relay enterprise data in real-time and thru the most effective transport attainable so as to preserve operational availability and include prices.

Consider the influence of a metropolis bus dropping connectivity to computer-aided dispatch and lacking route updates or a primary responder being unable to entry the placement of an accident scene. These sorts of eventualities emphasize the criticality of that connectivity being each dependable and out there. Just like workplace functions, these fleet options require always-on, dependable WAN connectivity to carry out their capabilities whereas in movement and whereas they’re wirelessly related.

Security because the Backbone of Fleet Management

Segmentation is essential. Take a metropolis bus for instance – a number of functions are working concurrently throughout cost companies, predictive upkeep, passenger companies, and video analytics. Each requires managed entry in order that solely the meant persona can entry knowledge related to every service. Using these examples, you’d need solely the cost processing firm seeing cost data, the upkeep division seeing predictive upkeep knowledge, and safety forces seeing video footage. This segmentation enabled by digital routing and forwarding (VRF) capabilities gives peace of thoughts for these on the safety facet whereas simplifying the day-to-day life for these on the operations facet.

Credentialed entry to enterprise networks can be essential for service fleets that run functions accessing stock databases, work order administration methods, and even cost methods which might be hosted within the enterprise core community. Identity-based safety insurance policies on Cisco SD-WAN assist make sure that entry to delicate data is automated and scalable to maintain the fitting eyes on the fitting knowledge.

Data encryption is essential for first responders, significantly ambulances, as a result of further consideration of affected person data. Privacy is important to adjust to HIPPA pointers so stricter measures could must be taken to make sure the info is safe. Cisco SD-WAN gives peace of thoughts with regards to the dealing with of delicate data as 2048-bit encryption keys, and underlying visitors encrypted utilizing the AES-256 cipher come customary for gadgets related by your routers.

Operational Efficiency – The Brass Ring

While all fleet classes require dependable and out there connectivity in addition to safety, transit methods, and repair fleets are additionally drastically involved about operational effectivity. The reality is that almost all public transit methods function at a loss and are publicly funded, bringing immense strain to scale back prices. Service fleets, whereas usually funded by personal business, are ever vigilant about controlling prices and lowering service name depend and length. Both have the necessity for automation, consolidation, visibility, and managing airtime prices.

Cisco SD-WAN is the Answer

Cisco SD-WAN gives fleet operators with the power to attach and monitor their fleet autos and automate processes whereas additionally offering wanted visibility, safety, and consolidation with the enterprise community.

The ruggedized industrial routers within the Cisco Catalyst IR Series come SD-WAN prepared to satisfy car environmental situations. These routers present dependable and out there connectivity by a number of technique of transport starting from 5G and LTE to broadband, Wi-Fi, and even satellite tv for pc. Cisco SD-WAN additionally affords configurable failovers between transports to make sure steady communication. The mind of Cisco SD-WAN, vSmart, can routinely route enterprise essential visitors over excessive bandwidth hyperlinks and ship decrease precedence visitors over decrease price hyperlinks, whereas the vManage dashboard enables you to see all of it in real-time.

Cisco SD-WAN comes customary with a bunch of safety capabilities that guarantee your fleet autos and their functions are protected on the similar stage because the enterprise. By creating template-based insurance policies, onboarding new gadgets include ease and helps bridge collectively your IT and OT groups as properly. The fundamental safety advantages of utilizing Cisco SD-WAN for fleet administration come from:

  • End-to-end segmentation that isolates and protects essential data.
  • Encrypted IPsec tunnels for knowledge privateness.
  • Identity-based coverage administration for each enterprise and industrial networks.
  • Utilizing Cisco Umbrella for cover towards internet-based threats.
  • Security options working straight on the router, together with embedded enterprise firewall, IPS, and URL filtering capabilities.

Cisco SD-WAN gives end-to-end visibility for each utility and gadget throughout your entire SD-WAN cloth. Between the IoT gadgets powering your fleet, cloud-native functions used within the workplace, and each gadget your staff contact – Cisco SD-WAN gives a consolidated console that’s assured to simplify your IT operations. Reliability, availability, safety, and visibility are all supplied to make sure that your enterprise and fleet autos are optimized and guarded in any situation.

 

 

Additional Resources:

Optimize and Secure Transit Fleet Vehicles

Secure the Industrial Edge with Cisco SD-WAN

Cisco SD-WAN: The Crossroads of Enterprise and IoT

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