Arista Networks introduced a Switch Abstraction Interface (SAI) option that enables its customers to deploy SONiC software on Arista switching platforms.
Arista switches Powered by SONiC (Software for Open Networking in the Cloud) combines the open source software first introduced by Microsoft with Arista’s EOS platform.
Arista’s SAI layer allows SONiC to run on Arista switches, leveraging Arista’s advanced hardware design and platform drivers. SONiC is an open source network operating system that runs on multiple hardware platforms and was developed initially by Microsoft for the Azure cloud platform.
Arista says the solution delivers robust software, modern streaming telemetry, verbose troubleshooting tools and diverse platform support. In addition, Arista provides integrated software and hardware support through its engineering and customer support organizations.
“This latest initiative is another proof point of the continued long-term partnership between Arista and Microsoft on our mutual cloud networking journey. This expansion of SONiC support allows customers to take advantage of Arista’s broad platform portfolio, high quality system design, as well as global support allowing for broader adoption of cloud networking,” said Dave Maltz, Distinguished Engineer, Microsoft.
“Arista has a long history of collaboration and support for open networking with major contributions to SONiC. Arista switches Powered by SONiC brings open software choices for on-premise enterprise datacenters. We are helping customers realize their cloud networking transformation around resilience, automation and modern analytics backed by world class engineering and support,” said Anshul Sadana, Chief Operating Officer, Arista Networks.
Key benefits of Arista SAI include:
- Choice of high-performance platforms from Arista’s data center portfolio for leaf and spine networks
- Lower opex by leveraging DevOps tools for consistent automation for compute and networking deployments
- Native streaming of deep platform telemetry with OpenConfig APIs
- High scale and extensive debugging capabilities leveraging from cloud deployment experience
- 24×7 global customer support from Arista services organization for SAI and platform related issues for a positive end-user experience
- Distribution of Arista switches Powered by SONiC will be available as a network operating system in addition to Arista’s standard EOS offering. Customers have the option of choosing between Arista EOS and Arista SAI with SONiC software on these systems, and as an added benefit, Arista platforms running SAI can be easily migrated to EOS, providing a flexible path to the mainstream, feature-rich EOS software for broader network roles.
The open source SONiC operating system is already available and in production on Arista switching platforms for select customers. Arista SAI on a range of Arista 7050X and 7060X switching platforms will be available in the second half of 2020.