Cradlepoint's NetCloud Service for SOHO and LTE routers provide dedicated, secure network for enterprise-class remote work
By all indications, remote work is here to stay. While we collectively wait for the pandemic trends to stabilize and abate, the realization that many knowledge workers are effective regardless of their location has changed workplace dynamics. According to a Gartner study, 74% of respondents are shifting at least 5% of previously on-site employees to permanent remote work.
A wide variety of remote work networking solutions exist, but many were designed for the occasional worker and not the full-time, mission-critical knowledge worker. Many lack the enterprise-class security, availability, management, controls, and compliance needed to protect the organization and keep top workers productive. As the rapidly deployed remote work solutions start to show their shortcomings, many are looking for longer-term options.
With these challenges in mind, Cradlepoint introduces NetCloud Service for SOHO, a service specifically designed with features and capabilities to support mission-critical remote workers in the same manner as would be found in the office. With this new service, Cradlepoint provides a dedicated, portable enterprise network to work from home and other places. NetCloud Service for SOHO works with the IBR600C router and a new E100 router designed for the needs of remote work. In conjunction with purpose-built routers, NetCloud Service delivers a dedicated connection, manageability from anywhere, zero-touch deployments, wireless-optimized SD-WAN, and integrated security with the following benefits for remote work scenarios.
To learn more about Cradlepoint's work from anywhere solutions check out our SOHO webpage.
Dedicated Business Connection
Every great technology for remote work depends on the underlying network. But what if there are limitations to that network, such as insufficient bandwidth and security, and household contention for resources?
Using a resilient LTE connection reserved for corporate functions permits complete segmentation and isolation of work devices to communicate over a dedicated network. These “air-gapped” devices can accept company configurations and policies from NetCloud and extend an office-based environment — in terms of application experience and security — wherever work is being done.
Manage from Anywhere
With a shift toward remote work, the number of endpoints has increased exponentially. This increases the burden on IT staff to respond and manage, often without proper visibility into existing conditions. Managing at-home work over consumer-class networks has hidden costs in terms of IT productivity.
NetCloud for SOHO delivers the ability to provision, install, monitor, and troubleshoot remote work networks at scale. With the capability to define and deliver policy across entire groups of endpoints, IT can quickly deploy consistent configurations and apply updates across endpoints, including application-aware policies and traffic steering.
Using built-in business intelligence and visibility, NetCloud for SOHO delivers health status, alerts, and insights to stay attuned to the status of remote work networks. Plus, it provides insights into network performance, carrier coverage, and costs to maximize the utility of the connections and location services to track the location of corporate assets.
Zero-Touch Deployments
Many of the existing conditions for remote work require that the solution be simple for the mission-critical employees themselves to install. Therefore, the solution has to function automatically, regardless of the user’s skill level with networking technology.
Cradlepoint offers the capability to ship the E100 and IBR600C routers directly to the end users with a preinserted SIM to connect with the U.S.-based carrier of choice. If speed or simplicity is required, the SIM can be activated by the customer while the device is en route to the location.
NetCloud Service for SOHO with the E100 and IBR 600C can rapidly deploy without requiring onsite IT staff or truck rolls. End users simply attach the antennae, power on the endpoint, and the cloud-managed device automatically downloads the proper configurations, policies, and security to connect. The Cradlepoint Verify mobile app helps users easily locate the position where the cellular wireless edge connection will reach its maximum potential, which is another key part of router setup.
Wireless-Optimized SD-WAN
To ensure the productivity of mission-critical employees while working remotely, they must have an environment that ensures an excellent end user experience for the applications they access. This requires bandwidth optimization, prioritized handling of critical applications, and network intelligence. However, not every vendor is able to perform this optimization capably over wireless.
NetCloud for SOHO builds an effective user experience with traffic steering, application awareness, and management tools to enhance overall performance. It starts by controlling bandwidth consumption by application class and WAN link type, applying app-level classification for more than 1,500 traditional and web-based apps (supported on the E100), automating class-based QoS for every flow (Auto QoS), and configuring traffic steering based on qualitative and quantitative events such as Smart WAN Selection (SWANS). Also important is interoperating with a variety of corporate head ends to not disrupt existing data center architectures and configurations.
NetCloud for SOHO offers capabilities to specifically optimize cellular links. NetCloud provides special insight into wireless usage, how carriers are supported (even dual modems and multiple carriers), overall data usage, and layer 7 information such as which applications are used across the WAN.
Integrated Security
In a recent study, almost three quarters of large businesses believe remote working policies recently introduced are making their companies more vulnerable to cyberattacks. The study further lists employee practices that could put company data and networks at risk, many of which potentially risk regulatory compliance if audited. Therefore, it becomes especially imperative to protect mission-critical employees with the same security standards as in the office environment.
NetCloud Service for SOHO with the E100 and IBR600C routers offers unified edge security features that give IT visibility and complete control over security functions. This service provides an isolated network to protect devices that can’t maintain security agents and supports different access security options — whether corporate extension (VPN and DMVPN), integrations with SASE providers, direct cloud access, or a hybrid split tunnel.
Additional security features supported on the E100 router include stateful zone-based and application-aware firewall, unified threat management, and authenticated wireless connection through WPA 3.
NetCloud Service for SOHO monitors security throughout the network, providing insights and alerts to potential intrusion events, as well as health and status of the WAN links.
Look to Cradlepoint for remote work solutions
Consider remote work solutions that provide IT with a secure, reliable, managed, and compliant network that offers the same IT capabilities and end user experience as the office network while being fully isolated from the user's uncontrollable home network.
For more information about this solution, explore these resources:
- Features of NetCloud Service for SOHO
- Routers: E100 and IBR600C