GigaOm Radar for Edge Platformsv3.0

1. Summary

There’s an excitement in the networking space around bringing workloads, content, and security closer to the edge. We’ve previously described how edge platforms evolved from four backgrounds—content delivery network (CDN) providers, cloud service providers (CSPs), telecommunications service providers (telcos), and dedicated edge service providers (edge).

The majority of providers featured in this report are CDNs, but these vendors are transitioning, repositioning themselves away from the “traditional” CDNs that have been around for decades, to innovative edge platforms. They are now playing in the artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML), internet of things (IoT), and real-time processing arenas, mainly as a result of being able to bring compute to the edge. While the programmable CDN languages were a precursor to ephemeral edge computing, what really changed the sentiment in the wider industry was the widespread adoption of cloud services—public cloud services in particular.

Cloud providers essentially laid the groundwork for computing at the edge. By offering both endurant and ephemeral computing to developers as a service, cloud providers developed all the knowledge required to expand beyond data centers into lightweight points of presence (PoPs).

Telecommunications players have infiltrated the edge platform space from two fronts. First, they offer cloud-based services such as colocation, private clouds, and other managed IT services. Second, with global networks and extensive partnerships, many telecommunication players have full-blown CDNs of their own. This makes telcos powerful contenders in the space with comprehensive end-to-end propositions.

Edge platform vendors provide a multipurpose environment that offers customers cloud-like services with minimal latency. This approach means that vendors have to manage many moving parts, such as compute, storage, web optimization, video streaming, and security, all at a global scale. These elements are brought together via orchestration, integration with development operations (DevOps) tools, real-time configurations, interoperability through application programming interfaces (APIs), and support for continuous integration/continuous development (CI/CD) practices.

Offering global coverage, edge platforms enable their customers to move away from virtual private networks (VPNs) to more flexible and intelligent secure access technologies. Managing how large numbers of users access a distributed infrastructure using zero-trust network access (ZTNA) and user entity behavior analytics (UEBA) can better secure not only each user but the wider infrastructure as well. For more information on these topics visit our 2023 ZTNA Key Criteria and 2023 ZTNA Radar reports, and our 2023 UEBA Key Criteria and 2023 UEBA Radar reports.

It’s important to distinguish among multiple definitions of what could be called “the edge.” Data from each end device can follow a different path before reaching the nearest PoP. For example, a desktop may connect to a home router, a tablet to a wireless access point, and a mobile phone to a cell tower. These are the outermost layers of the networks’ edges, and would pose the lowest possible latency. However, in practical terms, most edge platforms’ PoPs will sit behind (upstream from) these access points, in the access layers, aggregation networks, or even beyond.

We’ve observed that in the wider technology industry, the term “edge” is used fairly loosely. In previous reports on edge infrastructure, GigaOm defined edge as encompassing the technology stack that sits outside of cloud providers, on-premises data centers, and enterprise offices. Even within this definition of edge there are at least two major layers:

• Device edge: These are the outermost components, including end-user devices and sensors, located in the “last mile” of the network. Look for other GigaOm reports—such as the 2022 Radar for Mobile Edge—to cover this space.
• Infrastructure edge: This point typically sits in close proximity to the device edge but has characteristics of a traditionally hosted data center. The infrastructure edge represents a sweet spot for many edge applications and is the focus of this report.

This GigaOm Radar report highlights key edge platform vendors and equips IT decision-makers with the information needed to select the best fit for their business and use case requirements. In the corresponding GigaOm report “Key Criteria for Evaluating Edge Platforms,” we describe in more detail the key features and metrics that are used to evaluate vendors in this market.