7. SDN Finally Takes Off

The global data center and enterprise SDN market reached $1.1 billion in sales for the first half of 2016, according to research firm IHS Markit, up 42 percent compared to the first half of 2015, with all major geographical regions reporting an uptick in SDN spending. Research firms expect significant SDN spending growth in 2017 as SDN will transform the telecom industry and enable faster and more flexible onboarding and support of new value added services.

"In 2017 we can expect to see complete software-defined network infrastructure solutions that are commercially available, multi-vendor, based on a viable ecosystem of SDN and NFV (network functions virtualization) components," said Benson Schliesser, Brocade's top SDN engineer, in an email to CRN. "Adoption will rise, beyond the early adopter service providers, as enterprises and private data centers begin to see a manageable path to achieve the value of a flexible infrastructure."