Trends such as big data, cloud computing and mobile telephony have had a major impact on how data centers operate. And this has been the driver behind the growth of software defined networking vendors. The idea behind SDN is to decouple network control functions from the hardware plane allowing different hardware platforms in the data centers to be inteoperable. Through Vmware’s NSX, an entire platform catering for networking and security requirements between L2-L7 is provided to data centers allowing data centers to benefit from agility and improved economics. This has been the reason behind Gartner’s recognition of VMware in their Magic Quadrant for Data Center Networking. According to Gartner, SDN simplifies networks and creates a potential for long term innovation.
