Netskope, Palo Alto Networks, and Zscaler came out on top in Forrester's latest "Wave" ranking of SASE solution providers.

Relatively new to the SASE space, Netskope was positioned at the top of the leaderboard, with the researchers commending the firm for NewEdge’s unified platform as the backbone of its private global network, while leveraging AI technology. Its Admin Console was highlighted for a unified and intuitive interface, while Forrester also pointed to Netskope’s data discovery, classification, and threat visibility capabilities, encompassing endpoints and networks across both private and public clouds.

While commended for the above and an “above-par roadmap” detailing short- and long-term investments aligned with the firm’s strategic pillars, Forrester noted Netskope’s pricing as complicated and higher than its rivals.

Netskope was also recently celebrated by Gartner for its SASE tools, while also gaining plaudits for its secure service edge (SSE) offerings.

The firm was revealed this week to be pursuing a valuation of up to $6.5 billion in its initial public offering (IPO), following its registration of intent in August.

Palo Alto and Zscaler also score high

Palo Alto Networks took second place in the Forrester SASE rankings, with the security giant commended for the “detail, release cadence, and transparency” of its roadmap. Its SASE solution, Prisma, was described as having noteworthy zero trust network access (ZTNA) capabilities built into its GlobalProtect VPN client.

The researchers noted Palo Alto was “less forward-looking in addressing future challenges.” Forrester analysts recently told SDxCentral that the firm needs to invest in ensuring recent acquisitions, such as its CyberArk mega-deal, are fully and seamlessly integrated into its platform.

The SASE report also advised it to enhance its backbone controls and policies, diversify its hardware and connectivity options, and standardize its point of presence (PoP) services.

Palo Alto also missed out on the top spot due to high pricing and what customers have described as cost creep associated with growing licensing options.

In third place out of Forrester’s top three leaders, Zscaler’s SASE success was put down to a wide network of technology and channel partners, and progress in fine-tuning its pricing and licensing model.

While its ZTNA client was praised for intuitively routing traffic through advanced services such as secure web gateway (SWG), cloud access security broker (CASB), and digital experience management, and its strong reporting and diagnostics capabilities, Forrester expressed concern on the hardware front.

“The lack of broader networking hardware and connectivity is still evident,” said the authors. “Combined with its intranet, this limits Zscaler’s ability to steer traffic away from congested data centers.”

Zscaler is recognized for its zero trust nature by other analysts, remaining atop Gartner’s latest ranking of SSE vendors.

Cisco, HPE, Broadcom: M.I.A.

Cato Networks, Versa Networks, Fortinet, and Cloudflare were deemed strong performers in Forrester’s Wave ranking, while SonicWall was the sole SASE contender, singled out for providing mature firewall capabilities and “simple, cost-effective secure networking hardware” with a wide range of SD-WAN hardware and connectivity options.

Omitted from the rankings were Broadcom, with Forrester noting the business didn’t integrate VMware’s SD-WAN (VeloCloud) product line with Symantec prior to divesting the division.

“Customer interest in its SASE offerings declined significantly following the VMware acquisition — trailing the interest shown around vendors we included in our analysis,” Forrester added.

The omission of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), meanwhile, was put down to it not having maintained the same level of investment on integrating its two component SASE offerings, HPE Aruba Networking EdgeConnect (SD-WAN or SD-Branch) and HPE Aruba Networking SSE.

Finally, Cisco was left off for not having gone “far enough” to integrate Umbrella, Secure Access, ThousandEyes, Viptela, Meraki, Duo, and other elements into one unified SASE offering.

In contrast, Cisco was singled out alongside Palo Alto for single-vendor SASE platform segment growth during the first quarter of this year, according to Dell’Oro Group research.

Dell’Oro reported global SASE revenues increased 17% year-over-year (YoY) during Q1 of this year, hitting total sales of $2.6 billion for the quarter.

This year’s SASE surge is feeding what the analyst firm had previously predicted would be a $17 billion market by 2029.