SteelConnect EX Enterprise SD-WAN vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN comparison

Riverbed and Broadcom are both solutions in the Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions category. Riverbed is ranked #26, while Broadcom is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.3. Riverbed holds a 0.4% mindshare in SDW, compared to Broadcom’s 9.6% mindshare. Additionally, 50% of Riverbed users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between SteelConnect EX Enterprise SD-WAN and VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, Cisco, Broadcom and others in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions.

To learn more, read our detailed Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions

September 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Fortinet FortiGate

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 18.3%, down from 20.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SteelConnect EX Enterprise SD-WAN is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN is 9.6%, up from 9.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Fortinet FortiGate	18.3%
VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN	9.6%
SteelConnect EX Enterprise SD-WAN	0.4%
Other	71.7%

Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala

Manager, Information Technology Operation/Presales at TechMonarch

A stable solution with an intuitive interface and quick customer service

I have been working with Fortinet FortiGate, WatchGuard, Sophos, and SonicWall. I'm not as comfortable with SonicWall because of their UI and limitations. I prefer Fortinet above all other options. When it comes to configuration, I am confident in my ability to handle various tasks, including creating policies such as firewall rules, web policies, and application policies. Additionally, I can configure VPNs and implement load balancing, among other tasks. Overall, I feel much more comfortable working with Fortinet. Fortinet has made significant improvements by integrating AI with firewalls for threat analysis and prevention. In the past 2-3 years, they have launched FortiSASE and SIEM, and they also provide SOC services. Both Palo Alto and Fortinet FortiGate are excellent. While Fortinet FortiGate comes at higher prices, the functionality and support justify the cost. They promptly resolve firmware issues and inform all support providers about configuration changes.

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Jason Best

Data center network architect at Cloudwire

Analytics feature is very granular and comprehensive, although complicated to use

It's like an SD-WAN project basically. You really need to make sure that the product matches the needs of what the customer's trying to achieve and their overall strategy to meet their core business requirements. I think a certain customer made a mistake in choosing this solution because a large part of their network was Cisco and they had firewalls that were from Fortinet. I think they would have been better off and it would have been better from a CAPEX, OPEX point of view. It would've been more advantageous for them to have maybe chosen a Cisco or Fortinet solution based on their existing environment. Make sure you understand your network correctly before you try to implement any SD-WAN solution. That was one of the good lessons I learned about SD-WANs with this specific product. I wouldn't say it was a fault of the product. I would say it's more a fault of the CTO who tries to do things quickly without taking into account the existing environment or give the internal faculties the time to provide real low-level design implementation. It was more of a management mistake than from their technical team. In the next release, I would like to see things like integrated security but with local internet breakout instead of using third party solutions like NetScaler or Palo Alto. I would also like to see the integration of things like a VPN so that if you have remote sites where you might have remote workers that need to access the site from home or something, there's a VPN solution. Those are two key features and hotspots in the sort of global crisis. I would rate Riverbed a seven out of ten. I could never give any solution a 10 cause they all have good and bad points. To get any solution to a ten is pretty much impossible. If I was to rate it against others like Fortinet, I would probably give Fortinet an eight or nine. Again, I think you have to be careful because it's very subjective. I think it really depends on the type of environment, the type of customer you're deploying the SD-WAN solution for, and from which perspective you're looking at like if you an operator, if you're a large enterprise, if you're looking for a plug and play type solution. If you're looking for more of a security solution, I would go for Fortinet. It's kind of tough to say. I'd probably put the clouds a little bit ahead of the game because it does what it's supposed to do and easily. It's a little more of a plug and play type solution. Fortinet, for example, is more complex. I put it in a close second place, it's better from a security perspective. It has integration with FortiGuard. After that, I would put Riverbed in third place.

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Mohammed Gawas

Senior Network Engineer at evolved systems

Enhancements in deployment and monitoring simplify network implementation experience

We are dealing with VMware products including VMware VeloCloud, Cisco Catalyst, and Fortinet FortiGate as a system integrator, handling customer requests.We utilize VeloCloud's centralized orchestration for traffic prioritization. The impact of VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN's Dynamic Multi-Path Optimization on network application performance has been significant. We have tested this feature multiple times, and it was really powerful for steering traffic and packet regeneration, resulting in better flow. We have leveraged the automatic link resiliency feature in VeloCloud SD-WAN, conducting a VoIP test scenario that involved disconnecting link A and seamlessly shifting traffic to link B without any packet loss. However, we have not sold any CPE for VeloCloud in the last one and a half years due to the impact of Broadcom's acquisition. The significance of VeloCloud SD-WAN's deployment flexibility in an organization's network strategy is critical now, as every organization needs to reduce costs and undergo digitalization. SD-WAN provides security and quality of service without needing costly links such as MPLS, and using this CPE from VMware meets the SLA the customer needs. I evaluate VeloCloud's comprehensive visibility into network traffic as enhancing the network security posture. It provides detailed information such as user IP addresses, MAC addresses, and operating systems, giving us visibility for everything related to which customer, end user, application, and link are involved. On a scale of one to ten, I rate VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN a nine.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The solution is very, very easy to use."

"The most valuable features of the FortiGate firewall include SSL inspection, VPN functionality, and threat intelligence features for preventing threats."

"Their interface is very easy to use, it is without bugs."

"It is a scalable solution."

"Fortinet FortiGate provides superior protection compared to other firewalls, with high processing capabilities."

"The interface is very good."

"FortiGate Next Generation Firewall has a very high ROI"

"Fortinet FortiGate SWG's content is its most valuable feature."

More Fortinet FortiGate pros

"The analytics is the most valuable feature because it was very granular and very comprehensive, although a little complicated to use. If you're really interested in knowing what's happening on your network, it's a very good solution. That was the .NET Profiler part of the solution."

"In my experience, the setup process has been fairly straightforward."

"VMware SD-WAN is a complete solution."

"Anyone can migrate over to VeloCloud, it's that simple, just plug in the necessary cables and it's done."

"Initially, we had a scattered environment, but VMware SD-WAN helped us achieve centralization, which was beneficial."

"The most valuable feature of VMware SD-WAN is flexibility. It is more flexible than other vendors."

"This solution is as stable as most firewalls. VMware is a reputable vendor."

"The most valuable feature is the dynamic multipath optimization."

"VMware SD-WAN is scalable."

More VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN pros

Cons

"There aren't really any negative aspects to discuss."

"Scalability is one of the disadvantages. When it comes to scalability, you have to actually change the box. If you want to upgrade it, you need to actually change the existing box and probably you take the system off to other sites."

"It should come integrated or have its own type of network monitor tool in a module. There should just be one package, and you are good to go."

"The support package being an additional extra, even with an enterprise package purchase, is pathetic. Though I haven't had direct experience with support, the fact that it doesn't come by default, which is very misleading compared to other brands, warrants a rating of two out of ten."

"Cisco Meraki products are rising very quickly in the cloud and the connected era. Meraki products offer much better ROI, upgradability, and manageability."

"There can be more security in hybrid implementations. When a customer has a hybrid environment where some parts are in the cloud, we need a consistent security solution for such scenarios."

"NGN, reporting and controls."

"The pricing of Fortinet FortiGate IPS could always be improved."

More Fortinet FortiGate cons

"The routing scalability needs improvement. We have run into a lot of limitations and also primarily from a routine perspective, things like RSPs line support. It was supportive but not really supportive."

"VMware SD-WAN could be improved with more automation and more integration, but each vendor could use these improvements."

"The prep time and understanding what you want to do and how much bandwidth you'll need and how you're going to configure it on the network, that's more of an issue than anything else."

"I would like to improve the tool’s cloud security features. I would like to see high-throughput hardware requests in the product’s next release. The solution should also support multiple gigs which could be around ten."

"There is one feature that would set VMware SD-WAN apart from others solutions, and that is what I call inter-cloud connectivity. All the solutions regarding VMware are good because for example, If I go from my workplace to a retail office and I want to use my applications in the Cloud, that is possible. Perhaps we have customers who have their IT partial environments hosted in different cloud locations, such as Amazon and Azure, and the interconnection between the clouds, this is not possible. If it was possible it would be a market game-changer. Having the SD-WAN solution that is good at optimizing and facilitating traffic between different cloud providers would be great."

"Its integration with the security systems would be a nice implementation. They can also consider using a management platform for both network and security operations. This would be a great improvement."

"The initial setup of VMware SD-WAN was simple. However, it took six days to complete."

"The firewall can be more advanced."

"There is no security included, which is something that should be improved."

More VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its price could be better."

"Its price is affordable and lesser than Cisco. Cisco is expensive. In terms of licensing, there is only one issue. If a customer's license has expired a month ago and they do the renewal after one month, Fortinet renews the license from the start of the previous month. The activation of the product is done from the previous month, not from the date of renewal. The customers usually shout and complain that because they are paying today, the renewal should start from today. The support contract renewals or licensing should be renewed from the date of renewal, but Fortinet starts from the day it had expired. It is a loss for customers. They might have had some problems because of which they did not take the license one month before. Fortinet should work on this. Cisco doesn't do this. Cisco always starts from the day they apply for the license."

"Easy to understand licensing requirements."

"The pricing is comprehensive and clear. You can easily understand what you are purchasing, including which features correspond to each license and maintenance contract. Overall, the information is straightforward. Additionally, compared to other vendors, their prices are competitive."

"I think price-wise, the solution is totally reasonable since it has many products to serve, starting from small homes to massive scale sites."

"I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten"

"It is somewhat expensive compared to other solutions such as Sophos."

"Pricing is lower than Cisco."

More Fortinet FortiGate pricing and cost advice

Information not available

"You need to pay for a license to use this product."

"The cost of VMware SD-WAN is high, but I think you can still get better pricing if your volume is high."

"The price of this solution is higher than that of other SD-WAN vendors."

"VeloCloud performs as well as the Cisco SD-WAN but it is cheaper in price."

"The licensing model of VMware SD-WAN could be improved, it is not always that competitive. The biggest concern is to be competitive against other solutions. However, the way that the licensing model is designed is not corresponding to the real use cases of my customers."

"The pricing is very comparable to Fortinet."

"The minimum cost is $10,000 a month to have a monitoring station set up."

"Price would be a challenge for customers, because it is expensive."

More VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

No data available

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Construction Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	350
Midsize Enterprise	130
Large Enterprise	187

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	22
Midsize Enterprise	14
Large Enterprise	20

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?

When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...

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What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?

From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...

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What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?

As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...

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Earn 20 points

What are the biggest differences between Fortinet Fortigate and VMware SD-WAN?

One of our favorite things about Fortinet Fortigate is that you can deploy on the cloud or on premises. It is a very ...

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What do you like most about VMware SD-WAN?

One of the key use cases for VMware SD-WAN was assisting a customer in the industrial zone. They required virtualized...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware SD-WAN?

When it comes to setup cost and licensing cost for VMware, it is on the expensive side relative to the market. We are...

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Comparisons

Sophos XG vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 17% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 11% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 9% of the time

OPNsense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 4% of the time

Cisco Meraki MX vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 4% of the time

More Fortinet FortiGate Competitors

No data available

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN

Compared 15% of the time

Meraki SD-WAN vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN

Compared 10% of the time

Cato SASE Cloud Platform vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN

Compared 8% of the time

Peplink SpeedFusion vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN

Compared 6% of the time

Prisma SD-WAN vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN

Compared 6% of the time

More VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Fortinet FortiGate

October 2025

Download Fortinet FortiGate product report

Buyer's Guide

Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions

September 2025

SteelConnect EX Enterprise SD-WAN report

Download SteelConnect EX Enterprise SD-WAN product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN

September 2025

Download VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN product report

Also Known As

No data available

SteelConnect, Riverbed SteelConnect

VMware SD-WAN, VeloCloud

Overview

Fortinet FortiGate excels in providing integrated VPN, firewalling, and Unified Threat Management (UTM) with centralized management and high availability. It supports remote access and comprehensive threat protection, making it a preferred choice for securing networks.

Fortinet FortiGate offers a robust security platform with features such as strong intrusion prevention, application control, and web filtering. Its integration with Active Directory and SD-WAN functionality provides scalable solutions for large networks. Users appreciate its ease of use through centralized management interfaces, ensuring robust security with flexible configurations. However, FortiGate could enhance its graphical interface and technical support responsiveness, address firmware bugs and costly licensing, improve logging, integrate better with third-party tools, and strengthen scalability and memory for log storage. Complexity in configuration and the need for intuitive features are noted challenges, and there's a demand for advanced security, zero-trust capabilities, and AI integration.

What are the key features of Fortinet FortiGate?

VPN: Secure remote access and connectivity.
Firewalling: Protects networks from unauthorized access and attacks.
UTM: Offers a comprehensive approach to threat management.
SD-WAN: Optimizes traffic routing for efficient network performance.
Web Filtering: Controls and monitors web access and ensures Internet security.

What benefits or ROI should be considered?

Centralized Management: Simplifies administration and monitoring.
High Availability: Ensures consistent security and network availability.
Scalability: Adapts to the needs of growing networks.
Comprehensive Threat Protection: Provides robust security measures.
Ease of Use: Minimizes the complexity of security management.

Fortinet FortiGate is widely implemented across industries like education, finance, and government. Companies use it for firewall protection, VPN, and SD-WAN capabilities, ensuring secure perimeter and data center security. It facilitates remote access management and traffic routing optimization, offering reliable security and connectivity solutions.

Fortinet

Accelerate business velocity with enterprise-class SD-WAN. As enterprises and organizations adopt more cloud and SaaS applications to support an increasingly distributed workforce, the hybrid networks connecting it all have been more complex, less predictable and less secure.

Riverbed SteelConnect EX is a powerful enterprise SD-WAN solution that integrates best-in-class routing, application acceleration, network visibility, and security services – a flexible and complete WAN Edge platform that gives you what you need to modernize your network and propel your business in the digital age.

Riverbed

VMware Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN) is a secure access service edge (SASE) platform that combines many types of software-based network technologies in an attempt to enable users to virtualize their wide area networks and reduce their reliance on hardware. In essence, this solution makes it possible for users to reliably access their applications from anywhere in the world by leveraging cloud technologies. Users can simply, efficiently, and completely control their network devices and traffic. It ensures that organizations are always able to use the best possible connection to their data centers. VMware SD-WAN steers traffic so that it is always using the most reliable connections and at the same time takes steps to remediate any problems that it detects in other network links. This guarantees that organizations can access high-priority applications at all times.

VMware SD-WAN Benefits

Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by deploying VMware SD-WAN include:

Reduced cost of network management. Organizations that choose to employ VMware SD-WAN can manage their network at a cost that is 2.5 times less expensive than what it costs to use traditional WAN architectures. Its ability to both augment existing hardware and replace said hardware if the user chooses to do so is part of what enables users to reduce their overhead costs.

Ease of deployment. VMware SD-WAN makes it possible for organizations to deploy it without having to rely on the assistance of technical experts. When the device - whether virtual or otherwise - is connected to the internet, it integrates with a central orchestrator that pushes the correct integrations to the device in question. This automates the installation process and makes it so that anybody can initiate and follow the deployment through to the end of the process.

Easily segment networks to improve environmental performance. Users can divide their networks into multiple segments that share a single IP address. These networks can be incorporated into an organization’s IT infrastructure and enable it to run more reliably. One way it does this is by providing multiple potential channels for data to use to travel in the event that one of the data pathways is suffering from some kind of issue.

VMware SD-WAN Features

Centralized monitoring. VMware SD-WAN is monitored at all times by a centralized orchestrator. From one place, an organization can watch every part of its network. Instead of having to search for the data they need, it can all be found in one location.

Integration capabilities. VMware SD-WAN offers users the capability to integrate their network with the environment of their choosing. This enables them to connect their network to the IT environment that best meets their needs. It makes it easy for them to work with multi-cloud and hybrid environments.

Real-time data analytics. VMware SD-WAN can analyze network data in real time. This makes it easy for users to monitor their network’s performance. It also allows them to take steps to quickly remediate any issues that arise before they can become worse.

Reviews from Real Users

VMware SD-WAN is a solution that stands out when compared to many of its competitors. Two major advantages it offers are its ability to automate the process of creating and maintaining a virtual local area network and its intuitive user dashboard.

Sami I., principal cloud architect at Loihe, writes, “One of the solution's most valuable features is the VMware core automation stack at an SDDC. It includes NSX, the VMware virtualization layer for the networks (the LAN virtualization), which works extremely well with the VMware SD-WAN solution and is the primary advantage over all the others. None of the other vendors could integrate with the virtual LAN, making it quite complicated and virtualized to be fully automated.”

Chih S., senior technical consultant at a tech services company, says, “The product has a very good user dashboard that is simple to navigate.”

Broadcom

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya

Roxtec, Software Solutions Company, Rignet

Redmond, Coca Cola, Roka Bioscience, MetTel, Deutsche Telekom, Rockford Construction, The Bay Club, tru Independence, Triton Management Services, DevCon, AXPM

Buyer's Guide

Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions

September 2025

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