What is our primary use case?
Our use case for Cisco Cloud Services Router is that we have our workload in AWS, and we have different locations, offices, and plants for which we maintain the connection from these branch offices through our cloud environment using Cisco's services. Right now, we do not have any solution from AWS. The transit gateway has challenges or issues, so we had to put our Cisco Cloud Services Router in front of the transit gateway to have that route table and other metrics under our control, so that is how the product is deployed currently.
What is most valuable?
What's best about Cisco Cloud Services Router is the support. It's excellent, and so far, no significant challenges.
Another valuable feature of the product is easy integration with other products.
Manageability-wise, Cisco Cloud Services Router is also good.
What needs improvement?
One central area for improvement in Cisco is its product line offering. Cisco has ISE and other products, such as DNS Center and other components. Instead of small to medium-sized customers purchasing devices and maintaining the devices, it would be great if customers could have subscriptions.
A CAPEX/OPEX model instead of that Cisco code, where the pricing model is subscription-based, would give much better flexibility for the customers. The pricing and model for Cisco Cloud Services Router and other Cisco products could be improved.
One good example of what I want to be added to the Cisco Cloud Services Router in its next version is for it to be more of a plug-and-play product. For example, Juniper has developed QR codes, so if you need to plug in a device, you scan from your phone and connect to the internet. That's it. You can provision the device remotely through the cloud orchestrator, so I want to see a similar function or feature in Cisco Cloud Services Router.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Cisco Cloud Services Router for the last two years, and I'm still using it.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I find Cisco Cloud Services Router very stable. Cisco Cloud Services Router remained stable compared to other products that my company tested. On a scale of one to ten, its stability is a nine.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Cisco Cloud Services Router is a scalable product.
You need to pay the licenses; the higher the license fee, the higher the computing power and the resources consumed. Cisco Cloud Services Router is pretty scalable for my company's use cases.
How are customer service and support?
The Cisco Cloud Services Router technical support team has been very helpful, so I'd rate support as eight out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
My company used Juniper but went with Cisco Cloud Services Router primarily because Juniper is lacking, support-wise. The support provided by Juniper isn't really good, so my company didn't want to rely on Juniper.
Juniper is very competitive price-wise and beats any other vendor, but has extremely weak protocol engineers who say, "Okay, this product is RFC-compliant with a certain RFC number." Still, you'll discover many bugs when you go for real-time deployment. The bugs caused a significant outage for my company, so Juniper engineering is one of the reasons my company chose the Cisco Cloud Services Router over Juniper.
How was the initial setup?
Cisco Cloud Services Router is easy to set up because I'm a technical person, so it's straightforward for me to set it up and use the product on the network.
How long the deployment takes depends on the case and how you'll be implementing Cisco Cloud Services Router. The use cases of my company have been very limited in nature, so deploying the product has been very straightforward and takes up less time, in particular just a few hours.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Cisco Cloud Services Router is an expensive product. My company pays for the product yearly, and the price reaches roughly $800,000.
Though Cisco Cloud Services Router is expensive and its competitors offer better pricing, when it comes to support, no other competitor beats Cisco Cloud Services Router.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
What other advice do I have?
Twenty-five network engineers use Cisco Cloud Services Router within my company.
My advice to anyone planning to use Cisco Cloud Services Router for the first time is to sign up for the Cisco dCloud, where there's a Ready Labs type of trial that gives you a better look and feel of the Cisco Cloud Services Router. Please take advantage of the thirty or sixty-day trial to get a complete insight into the product, but before the trial, it's best to have a plan in place to measure your outcomes, so your decision-making becomes more effortless.
I'd rate Cisco Cloud Services Router as eight out of ten because it has an excellent portal and has remained stable with fewer deviations from the published RFCs. Cisco Cloud Services Router also supports even legacy protocols, apart from the latest ones, so I'm pretty happy with the product.
My company is a customer of Cisco but would like to become a partner.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Other
*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
