Doesn't look good for SCON engineers.
What are your thoughts?
46 replies (most recent on top)
Thankfully we invested in SD, that allows us integrate with Versa. And vice Versa to run wanopt on Versa. (Whether we do either or not). We will have to charge for something (wan opt or sf or sc), just support with oem Versa won’t cut it
It's not. He probably meant "Riverbed SDWAN." If anything it confirms lack of confidence in its future.
How exactly is Versa saving scon?
TB clearly approved the Versa play as a last ditch effort to save the SCON. It’s really up to Riverbed sales. Adding in the political and financial landscape, it’s not looking hot.
They may have built a decent product but the SDWAN market is just too crowded. They were probably hoping to get bought by a big company but VeloCloud and Viptela beat them to it.
Versa engineers are worried. Talked to one of them. They are wondering why they need help from rvbd. Have they built something that cannot sell?
There is no current scenario where Riverbed engineers will replace Versa engineers. They’re still two different companies.
That doesn’t make sense. Why keep the engineers who couldn’t build a stable product instead of the ones who could?
SCON Engineers are not worried as we are supporting the Versa software in the coming months. The Versa Engineers, probably should be worried.
The future is subscription and renting and leasing. Let’s not buy versa. Let’s rent them and throw them out if they cannot put their sh-- together
I’d buy a GUI for $1000, no more ...... no less
They bought Ocedo because they were enamored with the easy to use GUI. Versa would be bought because it actually works for enterprises and not just for home or small biz use.
Well, if we are able to sell Versa, what's wrong with buying them?
Please do NOT buy Versa outright. That’s how we ended up with our current Ocedo mistake.
@ZwV3eJC-6ain Good to hear.
I think at this stage TB are probably not interested in throwing more money at rvbd, they are most likely at 'cut losses' or 'get your money back' stage.
This OEM actually works well for this purpose, try before you buy. Their price is not going to go much higher if their success comes from rvbd sales only.
By all accounts I am hearing the Versa solution works and is solid. If the owners wanted to be bold they could pony up some more cash and just buy it outright.
Sdwan for residential to do NAS. Sorry but what century are you living in.
How is that going to compete when you have saas vendors Dropbox, iCloud Drive etc.
You really want the company to deal with support issues from residential ?
Bundled with wanopt to optimize file transfers
Can we sell sdwan to residential market? Think of a unified network among families living separately but accessing each other network resources like NaS.
SCON, now with lipstick!
I feel SCON platform will be phased out. There is no point in maintaining multiple platforms with different products. It's easier to sell a single solution then mixing and matching feature sets. It just leads to too many questions during discussions.
In any case, this looks like last effort to string together a couple of good quarters before selling it company off. I don't see Riverbed going IPO. God forbid, if recession sets in (predicted sometime next year..that's going to get very ugly :-(
All SDWAN vendors have their positives and negatives. Viptela’s weakness is Cisco peddling their ISR, a platform everyone loves to hate. VeloCloud’s weakness is VMware and their feeble bolt-on integrations and high costs. Both have stability and feature gaps however both have a large installed base that grants them the ability to BS with Gartner and, to a degree, Wall Street.
Versa has the features and scale but no customers and this is due to their decision to sell through SP’s, which tend to sell slow as to avoid reputation damage. Riverbed has no (enterprise) product but we do have customers. One doesn’t have to be a genius to realize that this is a synergy play, with built in risk mitigation.
Focus on the realities of what SDWAN needs to be and how it’s sold and you’ll realize this gambit is highly calculated. May have to lose a few pawns, rooks and knights to win this “together”.
Versa does not have high expectations. Not sure how much they are investing. Riverbed is putting in a lot more IMHO, esp with sales, integration etc. versa is not a market leader either. We are partnering with another struggler. And if god forbid the wanopt attach is a dud then it will be tough.
I'm curious what the people at Versa think of this deal. They excited? Stunned?
The new POF needs to prove his engineering leadership. This agreement is the exact opposite of what I was hoping for. Figured our new BU leader would’ve brought over some of the Cisco devs to overhaul SCON but I guess there wasn’t enough time or inability to attract the talent.
In either case, leadership nowadays seems to be an org chart filler, they just don’t do much now that much of the “social knowledge” is shared and known. Perhaps the future org structure flips the old, traditional structure around
The current guy is more like a politician - then again, he was hired when PO was around so what do you expect?
I remember being surprised when he was first named head of the BU as I thought his background was more M&A versus engineering. they should have corrected the problem sooner as soon as it became clear he lacked the ability to lead and build a complex product. I’m not impressed so far with they guy replacing him. He seems more of a talker than a builder.
PO is a decent person but absolute disaster in terms of leadership. He should have been fired a long time ago but didn't and the the result is this mess.
Not sure how high you are thinking - JK, PO, DN. It is hard for an exec to right the ship when it is too late. Not everyone is jobs and musk
The senior exec in charge of that disastrous product was finally let go a few months ago.
I did some vetting but decisions were based on other factors. I cannot shoulder all the blame. If you have been on such projects you know how it works.
Only people who should get fired are those that did the technical vetting before riverbed bought them. Next would be whomever had the bright idea to make ocedo enterprise.
Everyone will sell . One big happy famuly
No, they will be selling it as well. Companies will be able to buy the same solution from both versa and rvbd.
So should we be expecting Versa to lay-off their sales people?
Everyone in sales will sell it
Who exactly on sales team is expected to sell this? Aren’t they supposed to be focusing on “EUEM” and “HumanExperience?”
You got it. When I worked there I called it “trying to stuff 20 pounds of baloney in a 10 pound sack”.
SCON was a bad purchase. All eng effort was focused toward bolting features onto a terribly designed platform that couldn’t scale. It was doomed from the beginning.
I share similar concerns as all of you.. I suspect this is one last desperate attempt. Also I've heard negative feedback about versa from a few SD-WAN customers who were moving away from it and adopting SCON instead.