Cisco today threw its full weight behind the secure access service edge (SASE) architecture, thus eliminating any doubt that the Gartner-coined network and security category is more than hype.

SASE stitches together elements of edge computing, security, and wide-area networking (WAN) into a single cloud-native package. And, since Gartner unveiled the category in its  2019 Hype Cycle report, many SD-WAN and security vendors, including industry leaders like VMware and Palo Alto Networks, have aligned behind the architecture.

While far from the first to get a little SASE, Cisco is among the largest vendors to enter the space. And, unlike much of its competition coming from a security or WAN background, Cisco has expertise and a diverse product portfolio in both areas.

"I would say we have arguably the most complete set of pieces between what we have in identity, what we have in SD-WAN, and what we have in cloud security, and that's not an accident," said Scott Harrell, SVP of Cisco's intent-based networking group, in an exclusive interview with SDxCentral. "We didn't know to call it SASE, the framework came along later, but anybody who's been around the WAN market knew this transition was going to happen over time. It was just a matter of when, not if."

SASE represents an opportunity to put more of Cisco's networking and security services in the cloud, said Jeff Reed, SVP of product for Cisco's security business group.

Cisco's SASE offering will tie together elements of its networking, security, and zero-trust product lines. This includes elements of its Viptela and Meraki SD-WAN platforms to address SASE's WAN and routing requirements. Meanwhile, for security, the vendor will lean on Cisco Umbrella for secure web gateway, domain name system (DNS), firewall, and cloud access security broker (CASB) functionality. Finally, Cisco will integrate core elements of its zero-trust networking portfolio — which includes Duo, SD-Access, and AnyConnect — to verify identity and enhance the overall security of the offering.

"We had this opportunity ... to basically tie all the strength we have on the network side into the abilities and capabilities we have on the security side," Reed said.

But Reed emphasizes that Cisco won't be "lifting and shifting" existing constructs and running them in the cloud. Cisco is fully embracing the cloud-native underpinnings of SASE, he said. "We're doing cloud native, so we're not just lifting and shifting our virtual firewall in the cloud."

Security and WAN are, however, only two pieces of a larger SASE puzzle. There's also the edge, or the points of presence (PoPs) from which services are delivered.

Rather than relying on public cloud or colocation providers as some early SASE vendors have, Cisco says it has built out a global network of PoPs. For this, Cisco is again taking advantage of Cisco Umbrella, which itself already supports more than 22,000 customers.

"Umbrella started as a DNS resolver," Reed explained, referring to Cisco's acquisition of OpenDNS in 2015. "We're doing well north of 200 million DNS queries a day."

"What we've been able to do is then take those existing PoPs and begin scaling them, so they can handle tunnels for secure gateway and more capability for cloud-delivered firewalls," he added.

But while Cisco will be building out its service edge around existing data centers, Reed didn't dismiss the idea of using public cloud resources in the future. "There's nothing to keep us from taking those basic building blocks and deploying it into a public cloud as well," he said.

Much of Cisco's decision to enter the SASE fray is predicated on the rapidly evolving needs of its customers, which have seen their workloads and resources rapidly shift to the cloud, turning on its head traditional SD-WAN and security conventions.

However, the transition to a SASE model won't happen overnight, Cisco execs admit. Rather, it will be a gradual process as enterprises reassess how they connect a global workforce to an increasingly distributed landscape where applications and resources are located in multiple clouds.

According to Harrell, this puts Cisco in a unique position to help customers achieve their goals at all stages of their journey.

"Every customer you talk to is at a different stage of the journey," he said. "One of the things that makes Cisco so powerful is we can support that. We can support them whether they want to have a thick branch in all of Europe, and a cloud-first, thin branch in all of the Americas, and we can support them as they rotate through that transformation."