NaaS is a cloud model that enables users to easily operate the network and achieve the outcomes they expect from it without owning, building, or maintaining their own infrastructure.
NaaS can replace hardware-centric VPNs, load balancers, firewall appliances, and Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) connections. Users can scale up and down as demand changes, rapidly deploy services, and eliminate hardware costs.
Businesses that own their own infrastructure must implement upgrades, bug fixes, and security patches in a timely manner. Often, IT staff may have to travel to various locations to implement changes. NaaS enables the continuous delivery of new fixes, features and capabilities.
NaaS can provide enterprises with global coverage, low-latency connectivity enabled by a worldwide POP backbone, and negligible packet loss when connecting to SaaS applications, platform-as-a-service (PaaS)/infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platforms, or branch offices.
NaaS results in tighter integration between the network and the network security. Some vendors may "piece together" network security. By contrast, NaaS solutions need to provide on-premise and cloud-based security to meet today’s business needs, thereby accelerating transition to a secure access service edge (SASE) architecture where and when it's needed.
NaaS provides proactive network monitoring, security policy enforcement, advanced firewall and packet inspection capabilities, and modeling of the performance of applications and the underlying infrastructure over time. Customers may also have an option to co-manage the NaaS.