What is the advantage of installing the controller on-premises?

Automatic geographical redundancy and robust security are typically benefits associated with cloud-hosted solutions, which manage these aspects for the customer, whereas on-premises deployments require the customer to build and maintain these capabilities.

When SD-WAN controllers are installed on-premises, the customer retains complete ownership and direct operational control over the underlying infrastructure, including the servers, network, and security policies governing the controllers. This allows for full visibility and direct influence over how both the control plane (vSmart) and subsequently the data plane (WAN Edges) function, which is often crucial for organizations with strict compliance or security requirements.

Scalability and cost-saving are usually more pronounced advantages of cloud-hosted solutions, which offer elasticity and pay-as-you-go models, reducing upfront capital expenditure and operational burden compared to on-premises deployments.

Ease of deployment and management is generally a characteristic of cloud-hosted services, where the vendor handles infrastructure provisioning and maintenance, simplifying operations for the customer, unlike on-premises deployments.