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Explainers, tutorials and guides from the field — networking and SD-WAN, cloud, AI and AIOps, project management, and building a technology career.
Two 2025 deals redrew the map: HPE now owns Juniper and Arista owns VeloCloud. Part 1 of a vendor-neutral, 19-vendor analysis — who really competes with Cisco, and in which category.
Switching, routing, Wi-Fi 7, SD-WAN, NGFW, SASE, data-center fabrics and automation — a side-by-side view of what Cisco and 13 alternatives actually offer, plus a 24-row feature matrix.
Hardware ≠ licence ≠ cloud management ≠ support ≠ security subscription. How Cisco, HPE, Juniper, Arista, Fortinet, Palo Alto and others really charge — with real reseller prices from October 2026.
A transparent bottom-up TCO model — from a 50-user branch to a 10,000-user global enterprise — comparing Cisco, HPE, Arista, Fortinet, Extreme, Huawei and Ubiquiti. Hardware is the smallest part of the bill.
Customs duty and GST in India, NIS2 and data residency in the EU, tariffs and NDAA §889 in the US — what changes when you buy the same network in three regions, and which vendors are strongest where.
A weighted scorecard of 19 vendors, category leaders, use-case recommendations, a six-step Cisco migration approach, and the RFP and negotiation tactics that protect you at renewal time.
SD-WAN isn't automatically cheaper or better than MPLS. Here's the set of questions I use to frame the decision before anyone talks to a vendor.
AIOps is often sold as a tool. In practice it's an operating-model change. Lessons from my MBA research on enterprise-grade AIOps for telecom networks.
Every project has a RAID log. Few use it well. A practical guide to Risks, Assumptions, Issues and Dependencies — with a free template.
The move from engineering to project management is one of the most common — and least explained — transitions in IT. A practical roadmap.
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