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Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs Cradlepoint NetCloud vs VMware Cloud Director comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.5
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN offers significant WAN cost savings, with 80% expense reduction, increased uptime, and ROI within a year.
Sentiment score
7.0
Cradlepoint NetCloud improved uptime, reduced costs, enhanced security, and boosted productivity through better remote management and scalability.
Sentiment score
5.8
Organizations using VMware Cloud Director experience mixed ROI, with benefits in efficiency and cost management but variable expenses.
They are now back to do that with the remainder of their company, so they've realized the value in 12 months and are willing to invest in the remainder of their organization.
Information Technology Consultant at Island Networks
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN offers responsive customer support, praised for quick response, though complex queries may occasionally face delays.
Sentiment score
7.6
Cradlepoint NetCloud support is effective and highly rated, with swift issue resolution despite occasional response delays.
Sentiment score
6.8
VMware Cloud Director's support is helpful yet occasionally slow, with effective documentation aiding independent troubleshooting, but response time varies.
The principal third-level support is very good.
Technology supervisor at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
I would consider Cisco support a 10 out of 10.
Information Technology Consultant at Island Networks
I would rate Cisco's support, their customer service, and technical support as excellent.
Solution Architect at Sonda S.A.
I have worked very closely with Cradlepoint for several years and would rate their customer service as being among the best.
Product Director at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Around 70-80% of issues can be easily troubleshot by public documentation and KB articles.
Technical Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Regarding the technical support team of VMware for vCloud Director, I would rate them as good and I would give them a nine out of ten.
Consultant at Lenovo India
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.3
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is scalable, supports various organizations, with ease of expansion despite some licensing and feature limitations.
Sentiment score
7.5
Cradlepoint NetCloud effectively replaces routers and firewalls, supporting scalable network and security management for large enterprises via the cloud.
Sentiment score
7.3
VMware Cloud Director offers impressive scalability for cloud providers, suitable for medium to large enterprises, but needs private cloud enhancements.
Cisco SD-WAN is highly scalable and can be expanded to more than 10,000 sites.
Technical Consultant at Vertex Techno Solutions (B) Pvt Ltd
The ease of configuration and features like zero-touch provisioning enhance the scalability of Cisco SD-WAN, especially in disaster recovery situations.
Engineer at Routz
It is done through static whitelisting of the IPs, which is not a scalable solution since IPs can change at any time.
Network Manager at HPCL
Cradlepoint products support scalability very well in medium to large enterprise environments.
Product Director at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
VMware Cloud Director is quite scalable; I would rate it nine out of ten.
Senior System Engineer & Project Manager at TechnoPeak
I would rate scalability for VMware Cloud Director as 8, especially from the on-premises environment.
Technical Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is stable and reliable, despite minor initial bugs and transition challenges, with excellent user ratings.
Sentiment score
8.3
Cradlepoint NetCloud is praised for stable performance, robustness in traffic handling, minimal downtime, and seamless, dependable connectivity.
Sentiment score
7.6
VMware Cloud Director is stable and reliable, with minor upgrade concerns, improving over time to gain user confidence.
While some software-related issues and bugs were encountered, they did not cause the whole environment to crash.
Engineer at Routz
A simple issue in the control connections between the fabric causes numerous complexities.
Network Manager at HPCL
We tend to play it safe and use versions that have been tested more thoroughly, rather than necessarily old versions.
Network Engineer at a engineering company with 5,001-10,000 employees
There are occasional problems when trying to increase the parameters of a virtual machine.
Senior System Engineer & Project Manager at TechnoPeak
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN faces challenges in pricing, UI, integration, security, automation, and cloud integration, requiring simplification and flexibility.
Cradlepoint NetCloud needs better usability, SD-WAN enhancements, and affordable options for medium enterprises seeking cloud performance improvements.
VMware Cloud Director faces criticism for integration issues, outdated features, high pricing, and installation complexity, deterring hybrid cloud use.
Now, they change frequently, making it difficult to obtain long-term support.
Technology supervisor at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
Including more features like integrating with Splunk for monitoring vulnerabilities would help eliminate the need for other SOC solutions.
Technical Consultant at Vertex Techno Solutions (B) Pvt Ltd
The negative, or the downside of Cisco is the knowledge base; you need to be a little bit more tech-savvy and network-savvy to work with Cisco, while Juniper is a lot more user-friendly from what I can see, especially in terms of configuration and any kind of roll back.
Information Technology Consultant at Island Networks
The company realizes that there's a need for affordable connectivity products, especially for lower-end medium enterprises or larger small enterprises.
Product Director at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Cross-cloud migration refers to if a customer has something on Azure, wanting to bring it up on VMware or maybe from VMware to AWS, vice versa.
Technical Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
The console methods make management difficult until VMware tools are installed.
Senior System Engineer & Project Manager at TechnoPeak
At Layer 7, the load balancing does not have many features compared to other technologies such as NetScaler from Citrix or F5.
Ingeniero De Preventa De Cloud Y Servicios Profesionales at licenciasonline
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is considered expensive and complex compared to competitors, with variable pricing based on bandwidth and enterprise size.
Enterprise users find Cradlepoint NetCloud pricing competitive, considering it a worthwhile investment for its efficiency and functionality.
VMware Cloud Director is costly but considered valuable for its features and flexibility, with varying licensing models and discounts.
Its pricing is justifiable due to the comprehensive solution it offers.
Technical Consultant at Vertex Techno Solutions (B) Pvt Ltd
It is also relatively cost-effective for smaller businesses when using the Meraki version.
Engineer at Routz
The pricing of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is rated between eight and nine out of ten, where ten is the most expensive.
Technology supervisor at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
Cradlepoint's pricing is viewed as market competitive, offering good value for the money invested.
Product Director at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
The pricing for VMware Cloud Director is more or less reasonable, especially when compared to Cisco, which is significantly more expensive.
Senior System Engineer & Project Manager at TechnoPeak
From a pricing perspective, I would rate VMware Cloud Director as 7 because being the available feature set, Broadcom always offered more price compared to another product.
Technical Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN enhances connectivity with advanced routing, security, automation, and integration, offering scalability and efficient management.
Cradlepoint NetCloud optimizes wireless WAN with 5G readiness, enhancing VPN, automated failover, and network monitoring for primary connectivity.
VMware Cloud Director offers efficient multitenancy, user autonomy, flexibility, scalability, and robust security features in a user-friendly interface.
It also provides robust security features, including port security, analysis, mirroring, and multiple other security solutions.
Technology supervisor at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has integrated security features which include base firewall, URL filtering, IPS, and secure segmentation.
Solution Architect at Sonda S.A.
Integration capabilities provide comprehensive security.
Technical Consultant at Vertex Techno Solutions (B) Pvt Ltd
Cradlepoint supports the option for wireless to be a primary means of connectivity, rather than just a backup.
Product Director at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
A notable feature is the Independent Disk, which allows detaching a virtual drive from one virtual machine and attaching it to another, enabling more flexibility in operations.
Senior System Engineer & Project Manager at TechnoPeak
The most valuable feature of VMware Cloud Director is segregating the underlying infrastructure for the end user.
Technical Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
I believe the best feature of VMware Cloud Director is the multitenant capability because I use only one deployment and can configure many clients.
Ingeniero De Preventa De Cloud Y Servicios Profesionales at licenciasonline
 

Mindshare comparison

Network Management Applications Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN2.4%
Cisco DNA Center8.7%
OpenText Network Node Manager5.4%
Other83.5%
Network Management Applications
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cradlepoint NetCloud2.5%
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN10.7%
Fortinet FortiGate9.5%
Other77.3%
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
Cloud Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware Cloud Director2.5%
VMware Aria Automation5.5%
IBM Turbonomic4.7%
Other87.3%
Cloud Management
 

Featured Reviews

ND
Network Manager at HPCL
Faced complex visibility and policy challenges but have improved basic traffic routing control
I have found some other solutions more insightful and user-friendly as compared to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, but the basic SD-WAN functionality is good enough. I am using it only because it was done as a pilot project, specifically for my 60 to 70 sites. For the majority of the sites, I am using Fortinet's Secure SD-WAN solution and I found that more viable and more in alignment with my requirements. For example, there is not any Internet Service Database available in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN intrinsically. If I want to write a policy based on applications, I am not able to write it, at least in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN Viptela deployment that we have done, and that is fairly easy to do in Fortinet. The second issue is the logging capability. I think the visibility that Fortinet Secure SD-WAN has is not even comparable. Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN does not provide that sort of insight or control as far as traffic steering is concerned. With respect to the SLAs, I barely know which sort of SLAs are violated in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, so I do not have clear visibility on where the traffic is moving from at my spoke or hub locations. I believe Fortinet gives me a very clear picture of where the traffic is going. Overall visibility, whether it is data traffic or logs, is much better in Fortinet compared to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. The complexity of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN Viptela is noticeable and quite complicated to configure. If something breaks, you have to involve TAC and others to fix it. On the contrary, you can work with underlays. Even if your IPsec overlay tunnel is down, it does not impact your production. Thus, we find Fortinet's solution significantly better than Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN solution. I have used Application-aware Routing in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. However, I found it to be very complicated, especially regarding policy writing. For my breakout of VC traffic, we had to write a bunch of IP addresses for Zoom, Webex, and others. Presently, it can only identify Webex as an application, and I highly doubt whether there is any application identification for Zoom and other platforms, as we were not able to find it during our implementation. It is done through static whitelisting of the IPs, which is not a scalable solution since IPs can change at any time. Overall, the application-aware routing policies are not as flexible and scalable as the Internet Service Database feature of Fortinet provides. The struggles encompass policy writing, logging capabilities, traffic visibility, and complex configuration. There is also the issue of load balancing. We have faced considerable challenges with traffic load balancing between the links. Although the SLA targets are configurable, understanding how traffic flows is challenging, making troubleshooting exceedingly difficult. Overall, I find it a quite complicated solution with not that much operational usability.
reviewer2142177 - PeerSpot reviewer
Product Director at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Wireless connectivity transforms with robust management
There are areas for improvement, particularly at the lower end of the medium enterprise market. Cradlepoint's portfolio is lacking budget-friendly options. The company realizes that there's a need for affordable connectivity products, especially for lower-end medium enterprises or larger small enterprises, and is working on developing entry-level products in terms of functionality and pricing.
KuldeepSingh4 - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Experienced users benefit from resource isolation and valuable self-service portal while seeing potential in enhanced infrastructure visibility
VMware is not going further with VMware Cloud Director. They are integrating the VMware Cloud Director feature with Aria Automation only for the upcoming versions, primarily with the VCF 9, and slowly they are integrating some of the parts they have already integrated, and they might not continue with VMware Cloud Director in the future. They can make it more granular to ensure hardware-level segregation, the underlying infrastructure level of segregation for the end user, and a separate security boundary where users can access the end-to-end layer. End-to-end layer means my software layer along with the hardware layer. If they want to do a certain level of troubleshooting primarily on the ESXi part, that is what I feel is lacking for now because for an end user accessing the SSP, the underlying infrastructure is a kind of black box for them. For VMware Cloud Director, it can be more comprehensive if we enable public cloud integration as well. In today's date, customers are adopting a multi-cloud environment where VMware Cloud Director is much feasible to leverage the underlying VMware backend architecture. If VMware Cloud Director could be made to have more integration with the public cloud and do the day one, day two jobs for public cloud interface as well, that would be beneficial. Additionally, I recommend leveraging the VMware Cloud Director layer if a customer has a multi-cloud environment and is planning some cross-cloud migration capability. Cross-cloud migration refers to if a customer has something on Azure, wanting to bring it up on VMware or maybe from VMware to AWS, vice versa. In that case, VMware Cloud Director should provide some cross-cloud migration capability as well.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Construction Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise48
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business24
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise39
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco SD-WAN?
The pricing of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is rated between eight and nine out of ten, where ten is the most expensive.
What needs improvement with Cisco SD-WAN?
I have found some other solutions more insightful and user-friendly as compared to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, but the bas...
What is your primary use case for Cisco SD-WAN?
I have used Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN as a customer. I am a customer of Cisco, and I have been a customer rather than a p...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cradlepoint NetCloud?
Cradlepoint's pricing is viewed as market competitive, offering good value for the money invested. While some custome...
What needs improvement with Cradlepoint NetCloud?
There are areas for improvement, particularly at the lower end of the medium enterprise market. Cradlepoint's portfol...
What is your primary use case for Cradlepoint NetCloud?
I use Ericsson, the parent company of Cradlepoint, to provide solutions for wireless WAN technology. Customers are se...
Would you change anything about VMware vCloud Director if you could?
VMware vCloud Director works very well and there are not many things that I would like to see changed. However, a sin...
What is the biggest improvement you saw at your company after you started using VMware vCloud Director?
For my company, VMware vCloud Director noticeably increased operational efficiency. When I started working here a few...
Is vCloud Director convenient for building applications?
When it comes to building applications, vCloud Director offers you various methods to create cloud-ready ones. For e...
 

Also Known As

Cisco SD-WAN
No data available
vCloud Director
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Doyle Research, Ashton Metzler & Associates
City of San Antonio, Statue Cruises, Tour Dubai, St. David's Foundation, JBT, DSC Dredge
MicroStrategy, National Democratic Institute, and NYSE Euronext.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Fortinet, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and others in Network Management Applications. Updated: June 2026.
899,052 professionals have used our research since 2012.