Sophos has introduced its first-ever line of network switches.
Quietly unveiled last month and officially launched yesterday, appliances in the Sophos Switch Series are designed to connect, power, and control devices on local area networks, and engineered for use with the vendor’s previously introduced firewalls, wireless access points, and SD-RED remote Ethernet devices. SMBs can use the new devices, Sophos says, to extend secure networking functionality into remote work sites, branch offices, and retail or franchise outlets.
“Sophos Switch seamlessly integrates with the Sophos adaptive cybersecurity ecosystem to extend connectivity across office LANs,” said Joe Levy, chief technology officer at Sophos, in a media statement. “We’re removing the complexities of multi-vendor deployments by providing organizations and channel partners with a single source of management, monitoring, and troubleshooting.”
Sophos switches are also designed to make segmenting networks into virtual LANs easier. Separating guest device traffic and traffic generated by often poorly secured Internet of Things hardware from core corporate traffic is a widely endorsed security best practice.
Sophos switches are available in two sub-families. The seven wall mount and rackmount models in the 100 Series come with 8, 24, or 48 1GbE ports plus either an SFP or SFP+ interface module. Four of the devices come with built-in Power over Ethernet technology with budgets ranging from 110W to 740W.
The three 200 Series models come with up to 32 1GbE ports and either eight or 16 2.5GbE ports, along with SFP+. At present, only one 200 Series unit, with eight 2.5GbE ports, no 1GbE ports, and a 240W PoE power budget, is shipping. The other two models are expected to reach market toward the middle of the year.
Technicians can manage all Sophos Switch Series products via a local web interface, a command line interface, and SNMP. Limited configuration can be performed via the vendor’s cloud-based Sophos Central platform as well. Additional configuration options via Sophos Central are set to arrive gradually in the future.
A zero-touch deployment process, the company says, automatically onboards units within minutes once an administrator keys in a device’s serial number.
Pricing for the new products was not disclosed. All units come with local web, command line, and SNMP management, plus a limited lifetime warranty. An optional support subscription adds advanced RMA assistance, 24/7 phone support, firmware updates, and management through Sophos Central.
The Sophos Switch Series is the latest addition to the vendor’s secure access portfolio, which includes firewalls, SD-WAN appliances, and access points, as well as the Sophos Wireless cloud-managed Wi-Fi security service.
Sophos introduced a new set of firewalls with an extra processor designed to accelerate inspection of encrypted traffic last April.
