Charter sharpens its business services edge
Spectrum Enterprise, Charter's business services unit, is using Cisco's Meraki platform to tack on critical support for remote workers and teleworkers and for secure connections to AWS, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure.
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Spectrum Enterprise, the business services unit of Charter Communications, is broadening the scope of Managed Network Edge (MNE), an offering launched about a year ago and underpinned by Cisco's Meraki platform.
Spectrum Enterprises' initial MNE offering combined baseline connectivity (wired and wireless) and switching with security and managed firewall protection, Wi-Fi and LAN management, along with support for secure network cameras. The latest update, which still taps into the MNE portal, adds support for remote access workers and teleworkers along with a Virtual Edge service that enables business customers to connect securely to multiple cloud service providers, including AWS, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure.
Figure 1: Charter pulled in $1.69 billion in commercial services revenue in Q4 2021, improving on a year-ago total of $1.62 billion.
(Source: Charter Communications)
Charter launched MNE last year as it grew increasingly clear that IT leaders at small and midsized businesses, as well as enterprises with multiple branch locations, needed additional tools to smooth out operations during a pandemic that forced people to work from home.
"They were having to rethink their network," Bob Schroeder, vice president, enterprise data product management at Spectrum Enterprise, explained. "They had to quickly adjust how they accommodated work from home and had to put some of their original programs on hold to address digitization and their journey into this new world."
This latest wave of bolt-ons supports remote access, enabling users to securely connect to the corporate network while they are on the go. Schroeder said Spectrum Enterprise is among the first to enable that through Cisco's AnyConnect Secure Mobility software.
The new teleworker feature is similar to remote access but focuses on people who are working from home on a more permanent basis, such as contact center employees. Instead of supporting that capability through software, Spectrum Enterprise using a hardware client – Cisco's Meraki Z-Series cloud-managed teleworker gateway.
Figure 2: Cisco's Meraki Z-Series cloud-managed teleworker gateway.
(Source: Charter and Cisco. Used with permission.)
The Virtual Edge enhancement enables Spectrum Enterprise customers to establish a secure connection from their SD-WAN to AWS, Azure or Google Cloud, Schroeder said.
SMB and enterprise
Spectrum Enterprise is pitching the new features to its existing base as well as new customers in a market that includes both midsized businesses and large enterprise clients with multiple branch locations. Spectrum Enterprise is offering them directly and through its telecom service distributors.
"There's no business out there today that doesn't need some form of these capabilities," Schroeder said.
Spectrum Enterprise is launching these enhancements as Charter starts to see business services growth rebound a bit after the pandemic hit companies hard. Charter generated about $1.69 billion in commercial services revenue in Q4 2021, ahead of a year-ago total of $1.62 billion. Enterprise-related revenues in Q4 2021 hit $643 million, up from $623 million in the year-ago quarter.
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— Jeff Baumgartner, Senior Editor, Light Reading
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