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• No more broadband backup. There's no longer a need to hold broadband connections as a backup with SD-WAN. Now, all broadband connections are available for use at all times, making a more reliable network.
• Improve error correction. SD-WAN systems allow for both forward error correction and packet error correction. With multiple error corrections going on at once, that improves the overall stability of the network and reduces the odds of failure.
• Add overall bandwidth. The typical local area network (LAN) is running at gigabit speed, while WAN tends to run in the megabit range. By stepping up to an SD-WAN, the gap is somewhat closed, meaning more bandwidth.

• Reduced downtime. If network downtime drops, then there's more able to be done in the same time. Formerly lost opportunities can be acted on. Businesses using SD-WAN are 25 percent more likely to see less downtime.
• Reduced capital spending. A network up more often means less costly physical augmentation. Sixty-five percent of businesses with SD-WANs saw at least some reductions in capital expenditures.
• Better branch connections. Connecting various branches allows information to be more readily shared and used appropriately. SD-WAN is specifically meant to improve inter-branch connections.

On the surface, it would be easy to think that system downtime really doesn't cost anything. No one ever gets a bill for downtime, after all. In some cases, when a service level agreement (SLA) has been violated, it can even prompt taking something off the bill. 

However, downtime can have many costs that users don't consider. The real costs of downtime aren't always measured in dollars and cents, but many of them can have an affect on the bottom line all the same.

What Might Have Been

A familiar concept to economists--though not always so familiar everywhere else--is opportunity cost. Opportunity costs are costs incurred by not pursuing an opportunity, either by inaction or deliberate choice. When a business doesn't pursue a million-dollar line of business because of perceived lack of potential, the opportunity cost is that million dollars. If a company holds cash, for one reason or another, without placing it in an interest-bearing vehicle, the lost interest is an opportunity cost.

Downtime creates huge opportunity costs. When employees can't work thanks to a down network or application or anything else that experiences downtime, that business's employees are incurring opportunity cost. Not only can the employees not produce, which means that potential gain is lost, but the employees must still be paid, which turns into real cost as well.

Reputation Lost

Another less quantifiable but still important cost of downtime is reputation. It's well known that more people will tell others about bad service than about good. A 2014

American Express study found that the number of people talking about bad service beat those talking about good by a factor of almost three to one. 

There’s a growing demand for Internet access, with the world’s usage to include 48 percent of the global population this year. In many countries, the access to an adequate Internet connection will come up short. In 2017 and beyond, the role of fixed wireless will become more important, making it possible to meet the needs of consumers and businesses.

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) programs are becoming common in many corporations. IT divisions like them because it reduces wear and tear on the company’s equipment, and employees like the comfort of using their own devices. The main challenge of such programs, though, is managing the increased pressure on the company’s network.

It’s expected that the number of Internet users around the world will reach 3.6 billion of the population, or 48 percent, this year. The demand for a high speed connection challenges the copper and fiber options and their ability to reach both dense urban and rural areas. For companies looking for ample bandwidth and flexibility, the speed and scalability of copper and fiber come up short, too.

Fixed wireless is a kind of Internet service that is accomplished with radio signals. It offers many of the same things wired broadband offers -- without the need to run cable. There are many reasons to use fixed wireless service. If you're considering utilizing it for your business, there are a few things you need to know.

Before the cloud brought about software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN), but after frame relay stopped being the standardized WAN technology, most enterprises used multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) to connect to their WAN. MPLS is still the most popular form of WAN connectivity today, but with data- intensive applications on the rise this may be changing.

Back when cloud-based systems were first getting started, they were looked at the same way someone would look at, say, jumping the Grand Canyon on a soapbox derby racer built by a particularly bright seven-year-old. It was a clever enough plan, but almost insane in execution. Who would put valuable proprietary data in the cloud, where theoretically anyone could get at it? 

It seems like a nightmare scenario, but it’s a waking reality for most businesses. A survey by Adweek shows 90% of all companies experience unexpected downtime, and as many as a third experience downtime every month.

Without bandwidth, there's a lot of life online that just doesn't get done. Sure, no one thought too much about bandwidth in the text-heavy, low-resolution days of online living, but today, it's just impossible not to. With video, conferencing, analytics tools, and all the other potential uses of bandwidth, we need it now more than ever. The financial market is no exception.