CEO of Alkira Amir Khan saw how the pandemic changed all of our habits. For one, he noted increased reliance on technology. Then, he considered the importance of expanding the possibilities in the midst of the work-from-home mode of business.
As daily-use technologies expand exponentially, the cloud networks that host all of this information require more and more maintenance. So Alkira found a solution: an easier, more convenient framework to link data without having to move it using a multi-cloud network.
“What we are announcing is physical-site-to-physical-site connectivity,” said Amir’s brother and Alkira CTO Atif Khan. “If you have a branch and need to connect to a data center, or need to connect two data centers through a high-speed network, we have added that functionality.”
Amir Khan: a repeat entrepreneur with a mission
Amir Khan has worked in many firms before taking his current role as CEO and co-founder of Viptela and Alkira. Khan worked as Product Manager and then Director of Product Management for a total of about 10 years with Cisco Systems, with positions as Director of Product Marketing and Management at other companies in between.
In March of 2012, he teamed up with his brother Atif Khan to develop Viptela. This tech company aimed to improve network infrastructure. Now, over 25 Fortune 500 companies, including Verizon, use their technology. In 2017, the sibling pair sold Viptela to Cisco for $610 million.
After the sale of Viptela to Cisco in 2017, Khan turned his eye towards solving the compatibility issue of complex cloud networking solutions. Some of the particular issues he sought to fix are “expensive and deep expertise required in every cloud”, “slow responses to change requests”, “high initial costs”, and others. Most of these issues stem from a lack of universalization and simplification in the technology.
Khan’s solution: Alkira Cloud Services Exchange (CSX), “the first unified multi-cloud network delivered as-a-service.” That is, it provides an easier, smoother way to use the cloud with a single framework that is cheaper, requires no training to use, and makes use of much of the hardware clients already have.
The Khan brothers have followed similar paths
Khan received his Bachelor’s degree at the University of Mississippi in 1987 in Electrical and Electronics Engineering. He then obtained a Master’s degree at the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1989.
But Amir was not the only Khan to take the path of computer science and entrepreneurship. In fact, Amir’s brother Atif Khan also studied at the University of Colorado, specializing in computer science. After that, he joined Amir at Viptela. Then he worked as Senior Manager of Product Management at Jupiter Networks. He also worked as Director of Product Management and Technical Marketing at Huawei.
So the brothers joined forces to make Viptela a reality. Presently, they continue to work together at Alkira.
Amir Khan releases Cloud Backbone-as-a-Service in response to Covid-19
Without a doubt, the Covid-19 pandemic has changed the way business is conducted. For example, it has prompted greater integration between web-based services to make work from home easier.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has driven home the need for an agile and elastic network infrastructure delivered as-a-service to support the hyper-acceleration of enterprise cloud adoption,” says Nick Lippis, Co-Founder and Co-Chair of ONUG, an IT-focused community and annual convention host. Alkira latched onto this need. To meet it, they proceeded to launch Cloud Backbone-as-a-Service.
The Cloud Backbone-as-a-Service framework “provides a new way to design and deploy a unified, consistent way to deliver secure, integrated enterprise-class network capabilities as simple and powerful to use as a smartphone app.”
Khan writes that the service doesn’t require any special training to use, has zero upfront costs, and is customizable to fit different business’s needs. Therefore, it allows for the expansion of a cloud-based network with others with maximal ease.
Request a demo of Alkira’s Cloud Backbone-as-a-Service and learn more about it here.
