I haven't worked much with other solutions. I have worked with VMware NSX. It's similar, however, it is more flexible and is faster to set up.

In the past, I used Fortinet, Cisco ASA and Meraki. Currently, I use Cisco ASA and Fortinet. 

When it comes to security, we recently switched to Fortinet, as we feel it to be more customizable for our use case in RJ than the solution. We moved because Cisco scored lower than Fortinet.

We had reached the capacity in the data center. We could build a new data center or buy a new solution so we migrated to a new solution to save space. 

Some customers used Juniper and Aruba but went with Cisco ACI because the other two solutions weren't as user-friendly.

We work on state budget cycles, and several years went by without any kind of refresh. What we had were disparate solutions that were failing, and didn't have the same kind of redundancy or configuration. As such, the users were having a terrible experience so we had to do something. We then looked at ACI and Cisco and positioned it such that it made a lot of sense for us.

I have some experience with VMware. I'd describe it as more intuitive and easier to configure, however, it's a different solution as it's software-based as opposed to ACI which is hardware-based. 

In the past, I used Huawei HCI Data Center.

We were having some issues with our network, so we took some advice from Cisco regarding that product, and looked for another product to replace it.

The business switched because the legacy way of operating these type of data centers is no longer optimal.

We started with Cisco solutions and are now switching to ACI, which is the new solution. If it doesn't work how I expect, I will consider exchanging it.

We were looking for an automated solution and decided to build from scratch with Cisco ACI.

We decided to go with this product because the Cisco solution had hardware and software built-in. VMware is in the virtual world and so we went with the hardware and the software in the same box.

We are a Cisco shop. Right now, SDN is a buzzword. The next evolution for our company is to have an SDN network. Since we're a Cisco shop, it's ACI.

We've been a Cisco shop since day one.

We switched to this solution to be able to automize. We were starting to migrate our old legacy network from user campuses, backbones, and data centers into SDN technology, and automation was a requirement for the new solution that we chose.

We were previously using the Nexus 7000. We upgraded from the Catalyst environment to the Nexus environment. Now, we want to use ACI for automation and integration of third-party hardware.

We switched to Cisco ACI because of it improvements to our operations and integrations with third-parties.

Our investment reason was purely due to the depreciation of the existing infrastructure. We needed to get rid of the old infrastructure and we had to make a choice. We needed to decide if we were going to use 9000 or if we were going to switch to ACI. We ended up deciding to go both ways. We're going to do some stuff with the traditional 9000 and we're going to do other stuff inside ACI and so it's going to be a hybrid.

Currently, we don't have any other SDN solutions, but I have experience with SDN in NSX. I have certification in VCIX, VCIX-NSX, and NV - network virtualization - from VMware.

The biggest difference is that NSX is running on compute. It's running on the hypervisor level. But ACI is running as an overlay, on a switching overlay fabric. This is the major difference. In NSX you can put policies closer to the application on the NIC level, but on ACI you have a constraint that you need to reach the fabric to have security policies apply.

We were at the end of the lifecycle for the previous solution, which was Cisco Nexus based. We knew that we would stay with Cisco, so the proposal came up to choose between traditional and NX-OS and ACI. Therefore, we chose Nexus 9000, which allowed us to do both. Then, it came down to a decision on which solution to go with, and we thought SDN is the future. Thus, we chose SDN (ACI mode).

We were moving from one data center to multiple pristine data centers. We started looking into what can we do better operational-wise. We wanted to save time when we needed to implement stuff, etc., and were looking at the latest and greatest solutions.

The desire to automate was a big driver for us to use this solution.

With previous technologies, you had to configure everything by hand: the server, the network, etc. With ACI, you can deploy a service in just a couple of minutes.

A portion of Cisco's equipment is going end-of-life. Most of the companies that we implement for are using Cisco Nexus 7K, 5K, 2K so they have 752 implementations and some of their 7K's are going end-of-life. The newer equipment that's becoming available is cheaper. Sometimes Cisco will essentially give it away.

We switched to ACI because there came a time to make the decision to either stay with another 10 years with the technology that we had in place or go through this challenge and bet on the future with better, new technologies (and also new skill sets and new setups for our teams). We also try to resell internally to our internal customers and other departments. We help them find new ways to facilitate their core business. We do IT for them, so they need the best possible solutions from us to make their lives easier.

Today, it is sort of a nightmare for them too. Every time we have to do maintenance, for instance, on the infrastructure, we have to break their business continuity, which is not always good.

Cisco ACI was sold to us. Everybody is using it now.

We were using a different solution, but it was not for software-defined networking. It was for a different type of networking.

We knew we needed to switch to another solution because of security concerns. We needed a zero-trust model. 

Our previous solution was legacy, three-tier networking. The market is changing, and software-defined networking is becoming the way to do business. Our network was the last piece to keep up, so it needed investment.

We were using the Cisco 9000 and we reached a point where investment was needed due to depreciation in our infrastructure. We needed to get rid of the old system, and then decide whether to stay with the Cisco 9000 or move to ACI. For us, we decided to employ a hybrid solution that uses both.

We did not use another solution prior to this one.

This is a client decision on whether to switch.

We did not use another solution before Cisco ACI.

Our previously solution was Nexus, but I prefer Cisco ACI. I think ACI is the better solution.

The old solution was outdated and not scalable. It was difficult to manage in a large scale environment. We do not have many people, so we needed to automate a lot of things. This new product helps us do that.

I wasn't there for the driving factor behind the switch because I started when it was already being implemented. However, the company was already using Cisco before implementing Cisco ACI. The previous environment was an older version of the data center — 9Ks and 5Ks. Migrating over to the more centralized management of the newer ACI just makes sense.

We did not have a previous solution. We had a traditional network.

One of the reasons we looked at ACI was that the traditional network was going end-of-support. At that time we had to decide whether to go with the traditional approach or to go with SDN, which is the future, where we can do automation. 

ACI also has many benefits that network guys can make use of. We could not get that type of visibility: where the VMs are connected and which switches are connected. We didn't have that visibility. Now we can have that visibility into the virtual part as well. Also, if you want to trace a packet, there is a feature that helps troubleshoot.

The visibility helps us identify if the server is connected to the wrong feed or wrong LAN. We can immediately try to identify what the issue is, or if packets are being dropped.

I checked forums and sites. We asked the reseller if Cisco could come in to do a demo. We saw there were some things they could do that we needed in the company so we went with it. 

This depends on our customers and their change strategy.

I was not involved in the process of selecting this solution. Rather, I performed the setup.

We previously had two different solutions. We switched because wanted a more modern, scalable solution with a bigger infrastructure, so we went with Cisco ACI.

That decision would have been made by the customer internally, but they would do a LAN upgrade and an RFP. In this case, Cisco ACI came out as the winner.

We used Nexus 7000, 5000, and 2000 previously. The future is going to be on the data center.

We were previously using Cisco NX-OS products, which are physical, but we needed to install virtual. 

We have large data centers which need to be integrated with vRealize.

Everyone is getting faster and if you want to compete with other companies then you have to bring services to your customers that are at the level of the other companies. ACI is a way of doing things faster by automating. That's the reason why we have it in our company. We chose Cisco because it was based on certain conditions that had to be met, and of course, also because of the price. It was the best product in terms of price and what comes with it.

Going from legacy data center stuff to Cisco ACI, I saw the value it could offer the company that I was working with.

We are a consultancy company. It was mainly the customer who decided to go with Cisco ACI. The decision, however, was based on the benefits from an investment perspective.