Juniper Networks on Wednesday said its AI-driven enterprise now extends to the WAN. This is the fourth expansion of the Juniper Mist technology that brings artificial intelligence to the LAN, WLAN, security and now, the WAN.

Juniper Mist WAN Assurance is part Juniper’s AI-driven enterprise strategy, or the client to cloud automation experience. This experience begins with WI-Fi Assurance. This makes Wi-Fi predictable, reliable and measurable.

Next is Wired Assurance. It delivers reliable wired experiences. In February, Juniper announced updates to its Juniper Connected Security strategy. Referred to as a threat-aware network, Juniper offers deep network visibility and security policy enforcement to all connection points across the network.

Christian Gilby is senior director of product marketing with Mist, a Juniper company.

Mist Systems’ Christian Gilby

“This fourth iteration of the AI-driven enterprise is about the WAN,” Gilby told Channel Futures. “So we’re extending Mist AI to the WAN, or SD-WAN space, which is another challenging area as you look at networking.”

That challenge is businesses having connections for multiple branch sites going over the internet, and getting insight to understand the user experience across that link.

“From the network evolution perspective, we started from the edge and now we’re working our way in,” he said.

WAN Assurance Shifts Focus to the User

Juniper Mist WAN Assurance brings AI-driven insights for the WAN and branch to Juniper’s secure SD-WAN solution. The goal is to shift the focus from network and application behavior to actual user experiences.

Here’s more about the Juniper Mist WAN Assurance cloud-based service:

The extension to Marvis is a conversational interface that streamlines operations. The Marvis enhancement uses two new technologies — natural language understanding and knowledge graphs. The knowledge graph is a data science tool that allows Marvis to navigate the data sets faster.

“Our view on the conversational interface is that ultimately this can evolve to become part of an IT team,” said Gilby. “If you look at trends in the market today, there’s mobile — that’s been a trend for quite some time; IoT; and there are more devices coming into the enterprise. And it’s more challenging to support those [devices]. IT teams are pressured on budget. And you can’t double the number of support staff as you double the number of devices coming in. That’s where we believe AI is critical.”

More About Marvis

Courtesy: Juniper Networks

Here are the enhancements to Marvis, the interactive IT assistant for insight and troubleshooting.

Dartmouth College uses Marvis. As a result, the school saves 90% in …

… the number of help desk tickets escalating to IT.

The new WAN Assurance is suitable for all Juniper and Mist partners.

“But certainly our Enterprise Plus partners will be a big focus for this. We do a lot of sales training and enablement with them,” said Gilby.

Expect to see the company enhance sales plays for this latest product release.

“As I talk to partners, what’s exciting is seeing Mist AI extended across the portfolio and the added value proposition for their customers,” Gilby added.

Strategic Partners Weigh In

Sean Stenovitch, vice president, operations and partner management at Kudelski Security, agrees.

“Juniper has been a strategic partner of ours for years. With their expanded adoption of artificial intelligence through the Mist platform, we’re able to have broader business solution discussions with our clients,” Stenovitch told Channel Futures. “This allows us to focus on their desired outcome and help design solutions that suite them. It also helps us maintain a more strategic role with our customers as a trusted adviser. Juniper Mist WAN Assurance creates a greater story for our team to present to our clients.”

In Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Data Center and Cloud Networking, published in June, Juniper Networks is in the leader quadrant with Cisco and Arista Networks. One of Juniper’s strengths, according to Gartner, is its road map. That road map includes applying AI to improve data center networking efficiency to align with the emerging needs of customers.

The product will be available later this year. Keep an eye out for new branch office access points coming soon.