Aryaka lands deal with China Mobile
Aryaka announced a partnership with China Mobile International (CMI) to deliver what the company claims to be the first compliant global SD-WAN service for international companies with locations in China, and Chinese companies with a global presence.
Under the agreement, China Mobile will be able to sell a combined solution of Aryaka’s SD-WAN with CMI internet connectivity. The companies said this will enable them to deliver SD-WAN services optimized for modern global enterprise applications.
“Aryaka’s global SD-WAN, combined with our vast infrastructure in China and around the world, will enable CMI to answer the demand for an SD-WAN that can meet the SLA requirements of enterprise applications,” said Daniel Chen, president at CMI USA, in a statement. “Teaming with Aryaka is a win-win for global customers that are doing business in China and Chinese enterprises with a global presence.”
China Mobile said the partnership will enable it to offer foreign companies a sanctioned SD-WAN service supporting locations in China, which is fully compliant with local regulations and privacy policies.
The deal is significant with the Chinese government having issued a mandate last July to state-run telecommunication firms China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom to block individuals’ access to virtual private networks (VPNs) by Feb. 1 of this year, as noted by Bloomberg Technology last summer.
These regulations make it difficult for foreign service providers to make their SD-WAN services available in China without working with one of the state-run telecommunications firms. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said it would step up enforcement against unauthorized VPNs in January 2018; although, it is uncertain about the degree to which these regulations have been enforced.
“This is a powerful partnership because Aryaka and CMI complement each other in ways that immediately benefit global enterprises,” said Shawn Farshchi, president and CEO of Aryaka. “Aligning our resources will increase enterprise agility by simplifying the job of deploying and managing SD-WANs that meet the singular compliance requirements in China. Together, Aryaka and CMI will provide the only solution that can deliver significantly better performance for both on-premises and SaaS/cloud applications anywhere in the world.”
Aryaka isn’t the only foreign service provider to make its SD-WAN service available in China, however. Versa Networks, for example, was selected by China Telecom last September as its primary vendor for SD-WAN. China Telecom said it expected the addition of Versa’s SD-WAN to help the company acquire more customers both nationally and internationally.
