The second set of startups that aced the Big Problem Challenge focus on enterprise infrastructure, such as advanced networking, disaster recovery, and cloud infrastructure.
In Challenge #2, 42 startups participated, and 20 passed this test. For the startups that didn’t move on in this round, the main issue was either 1) they never detailed the problem, instead jumping right ahead to the solution, or 2) their description of the problem was confusing, unbelievable, or both.
The 20 startups that passed the test all clearly articulated the problem they solve in terms that non-experts can understand. They illustrated the scope of the problem, and they gave evidence for why the problem they target will continue to get worse if it’s not addressed.
The enterprise networking and security stack is located in the office or data center, but large numbers of staff are now somewhere else, working from home or on the road.
Billions of dollars have been spent on centralized or hub and spoke network/security architecture, but the world of work is now ultra-distributed, and remote workers suffer through poor IT experiences.
Businesses lack the visibility and detailed insight needed to assure compliance and eliminate data breaches. Legacy technology required security teams to know what data they have, where it is managed, who can access it, and all of the ways that it can be exposed to security, privacy, and compliance issues, but both the modern data and current threat environments have made those processes and technologies obsolete.
The cloud ushered in distributed development, scripted deployments, microservices architectures, and an overall a permissive environment where no individual or group can know what is being developed and deployed at any given point in time. This leads companies to be continuously caught off-guard by exposures, compromises, and breaches.
Enterprise networks are more complex than ever. Half of all workloads now live in the cloud. Edge clouds are also becoming common, and data is moving from the core to both the edge and cloud. Meanwhile, enterprises are increasingly connecting their networks to partner and customer networks.
As networks become more complex and the number of resources the enterprise needs to connect to increases, legacy solutions (MPLS and SDWAN) no longer work. Since SD-WAN relies on tunnels between endpoints, which have exploded in number, the number of SD-WAN tunnels infrastructure and operations teams must deploy and manage is not scalable.
Most disaster recovery software was designed for on-premises deployment. Thus, it can’t take advantage of the two greatest advantages of cloud infrastructure: 1) highly scalable and economical storage (object storage or Azure Blob Storage) and 2) the ability to rapidly deploy compute resources (servers) on demand.
Cloud-based DR that uses legacy DR software can’t take advantage of the economic advantages of cloud infrastructure. Without scalable, economical DR, moving to the cloud can be more expensive than legacy on-prem solutions.
