Traditional Networks Hold You Back
MPLS was built for a different era. If your network still runs on legacy circuits, you’re paying more for less.
Locked Into One Carrier
Your MPLS contract ties you to a single provider’s pricing, timeline, and service quality. When they underperform, you have no leverage and no alternative. Adding bandwidth or a new site means waiting on their schedule, at their price.
3-5x cost premium per MbpsBandwidth Costs Keep Climbing
MPLS bandwidth is expensive and inflexible. Adding capacity means new circuits, long lead times, and more monthly spend. Most businesses end up overprovisioning just to have headroom, paying for capacity they only use during peak hours.
Weeks to add capacityCloud Apps Run Slow
Traditional WAN routes all traffic through headquarters, even traffic headed to the cloud. Your Microsoft 365, Zoom, and CRM traffic takes the long way around instead of the direct path to the provider. Users notice the lag.
+30-80ms latency via backhaulNo Real Failover
When your primary circuit goes down, so does your business. Most legacy setups lack automatic failover. The backup (if one exists) requires manual intervention, and every minute of downtime costs money and credibility with your customers.
Minutes to hours of downtimeOne Network. Every Location.
Your network should work as hard as your business does.
Who SD-WAN Is Built For
SD-WAN solves specific problems. If any of these describe your business, it’s worth a conversation.
Multi-Site Operations
Running 3+ locations that need consistent, reliable connectivity between them.
Cloud-First Teams
Daily operations rely on SaaS tools, VoIP, video conferencing, or cloud-hosted ERP systems.
Stuck on MPLS
Paying premium rates for rigid circuits that can’t keep up with how the business actually works today.
IT Stretched Thin
Need network intelligence built into the infrastructure, not bolted on as another thing to manage.
SD-WAN, Sourced and Managed for You
We don’t sell one carrier’s version of SD-WAN. We design the right solution from all major carriers, deploy it across your sites, and stay with your account after the contract is signed.
Four steps from first call to ongoing support.
What SD-WAN Delivers
The intelligence layer built into the solution.
Traffic Prioritization
Voice, video, and critical apps get priority bandwidth automatically. Non-essential traffic uses what’s left.
Automatic Failover
When a connection drops, traffic reroutes to the next available path in under a second. No manual intervention, no downtime.
Multi-Carrier Aggregation
Combine fiber, broadband, LTE, and satellite into one network. Each circuit earns its place or gets replaced.
Cloud On-Ramps
Direct paths to AWS, Azure, Microsoft 365, and other cloud platforms. Traffic bypasses the corporate backbone and takes the fastest route.
Real-Time Visibility
Latency, jitter, packet loss, and throughput tracked across every circuit by the provider’s platform.
Bandwidth Optimization
SD-WAN distributes load across all available connections dynamically. You get more usable throughput from the circuits you’re already paying for.
How SD-WAN Compares to Other Options
SD-WAN is not the right fit for every situation. Here is how it stacks up against the alternatives.
SD-WAN vs. Traditional MPLS
MPLS was built for a different era. Dedicated circuits, single-carrier contracts, and backhaul routing made sense when cloud didn’t exist. Today, those same traits work against you.
With traditional MPLS, you pay a premium per Mbps for rigid bandwidth you can’t easily scale. Adding a site or increasing capacity means waiting on a single carrier’s timeline. Cloud traffic gets routed back through your headquarters before it reaches the application, adding latency to every transaction.
SD-WAN replaces that model. Traffic is routed intelligently across multiple connection types: fiber, broadband, LTE. Each site gets direct cloud access. Failover is automatic, not manual. And because we source across all major carriers, you’re not locked into one provider’s pricing or schedule.
SD-WAN vs. Point-to-Point Circuits
Point-to-point circuits dedicate a single connection between two locations. Reliable and low-latency, but expensive per site and rigid. Adding a new location means ordering a new circuit, which takes 60 to 90 days.
SD-WAN connects all your sites through an intelligent software overlay using whatever circuits are available: fiber, broadband, or LTE. Adding a location does not require ordering new infrastructure.
SD-WAN vs. Standalone Failover
Traditional failover keeps a backup circuit idle until the primary fails. You pay for capacity you rarely use.
SD-WAN runs all circuits simultaneously with active-active path selection. If one path degrades, traffic shifts in sub-seconds. The network continuously routes around problems rather than waiting for a failover event to trigger.
SD-WAN vs. Firewall
These are different tools that do different jobs. A firewall enforces security rules: what traffic is allowed in and out of your network. SD-WAN optimizes how traffic is routed across multiple paths.
Most enterprise-grade SD-WAN platforms include integrated firewall features, but they are not the same thing and one does not replace the other. The short answer: most businesses need both. SD-WAN handles connectivity. A firewall handles the perimeter.
What This Looks Like in the Real World
How SD-WAN stacks up against traditional MPLS across the metrics that matter.
Illustrative comparison based on typical enterprise deployments. Actual results vary by configuration.
We Stay With Your Account
The contract signing is the start of the relationship. You get a dedicated account manager who knows your network, your business, and your history.
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One ContactWhen something changes, you call one person who already has the context. No support queues. No re-explaining your setup.
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Renewals HandledBefore your contract expires, we review what changed, renegotiate terms, and make sure you are still on the right plan.
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Changes on Your TermsNew location, bandwidth upgrade, adding a failover circuit. One call to Speedstream and we coordinate everything with the provider.
Common SD-WAN Questions
Straight answers. No jargon.
SD-WAN (Software-Defined Wide Area Network) uses software to intelligently route traffic across multiple internet connections. Instead of depending on a single expensive MPLS circuit, SD-WAN combines fiber, broadband, LTE, and other connections into one network. It automatically sends each application over the best available path based on real-time conditions.
MPLS is a dedicated private circuit from a single carrier. It’s reliable but expensive, inflexible, and slow to deploy. SD-WAN aggregates multiple cheaper connections and adds intelligence on top. You get similar (often better) performance at a fraction of the cost, with faster deployment and built-in failover. Most businesses see 40 to 60% cost reduction when moving from MPLS to SD-WAN.
Yes. SD-WAN sits on top of your existing connections. If you have fiber from one carrier and broadband from another, SD-WAN combines them. We typically recommend keeping your current connections and adding diversity where gaps exist. No rip-and-replace required.
For a typical deployment, 4 to 6 weeks from design approval to go-live. That’s per site. Multi-site rollouts are staggered and managed on a schedule we build with you. The timeline depends on existing infrastructure and carrier provisioning at each location.
Traditional MPLS routes cloud traffic back through your headquarters before it reaches the cloud, adding latency to every transaction. SD-WAN supports direct cloud on-ramps, so traffic goes straight from each site to your cloud provider. For applications like Microsoft 365, Salesforce, or hosted phone systems, the difference shows in faster load times, fewer dropped calls, and better video quality across all your locations.
SD-WAN encrypts all traffic across every path using IPsec tunnels, which offers more protection than most MPLS deployments by default. Most enterprise platforms also include integrated firewall features, traffic segmentation, and access control policies. That said, SD-WAN handles connectivity security, not your full security stack. It works alongside a next-generation firewall and a broader security policy. We help you source the right combination based on your industry and compliance requirements.
Ready to Upgrade Your Business Network?
One advisor. We compare options, negotiate the right contract, and handle everything from deployment to ongoing support.
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