SonicWall Targets Enterprises With New Appliance Line
The NSA E7500, the NSA E6500 and the NSA E550 UTM appliances are designed for network environments that require thorough traffic inspection, but also need high throughput speeds, says Jon Kuhn, SonicWall's product management director for the NSA appliance line.
The NSA E7500, the only model that's available today, is geared toward central enterprise sites with distributed networks, and is appropriate for web or application hosting, managed services, or application service provider environments, said Kuhn.
The NSA E6500 is meant to serve as a central UTM appliance for midmarket firms, while the NSA E5500 is ideal for local branch offices, added Kuhn. Both will be released later this year.
The NSA UTM appliances can classify applications and prioritize available bandwidth through the use of policies, and their ability to route traffic without having to proxy it enables them to scan hundreds of data streams simultaneously, Kuhn said.
SonicWall will initially bring the NSA appliances to market only through its Gold and Silver partners, as a way of adding value to the higher levels of its channel program, according to Kuhn.
The vendor will also embark on a partner recruitment campaign over the next few quarters that will target a new breed of partner that that have expertise in large network environments.
With the NSA line, SonicWall isn't necessarily looking to steal channel partners from Cisco and Juniper, insists Kuhn. "We're offering partners a different type of solution, something new to sell that's not available to the market today," he said.
SonicWall didn't disclose pricing for the NSA line, but a company spokesperson gave an estimate of $10,000 for the NSA E550 to $30,000 for the NSA 7500.