Cisco Secure Workload vs Nutanix Flow Network Security comparison

Cisco and Nutanix are both solutions in the Microsegmentation Software category. Cisco is ranked #5 with an average rating of 8.7, while Nutanix is ranked #4 with an average rating of 9.2. Cisco holds a 10.2% mindshare in MS, compared to Nutanix’s 8.2% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Nutanix users who would recommend it.

Cisco Secure Workload

Read 15 Cisco Secure Workload reviews

2,811 Views
1,867 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Nutanix Flow Network Security

Read 9 Nutanix Flow Network Security reviews

1,869 Views
1,189 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Cisco Secure Workload

Nutanix Flow Network Security

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

Cisco Secure Workload and Nutanix Flow Network Security compete in the network security category. Nutanix Flow has the upper hand due to better pricing and asset management, despite Cisco's robust security features.

Features: Cisco Secure Workload offers detailed workload protection, visibility, and control over network traffic in multi-cloud environments. It provides deep network visibility and automated policy discovery which is crucial for managing large-scale environments. Nutanix Flow Network Security integrates security with simplified network micro-segmentation, effective policy management, and easy control of virtual networking, making it user-friendly and easy to deploy.

Room for Improvement: Cisco Secure Workload requires improvements in its complex setup and high initial cost, making it less appealing for smaller businesses. The extensive configuration needs could be simplified for faster deployment. Nutanix Flow Network Security could enhance its scalability to cater to growing needs and improve its documentation to assist users in better understanding its API capabilities. Better integration with third-party solutions could also enhance its offering.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco Secure Workload involves complex configurations for deployment but is supported by comprehensive customer service. Nutanix Flow Network Security excels with its streamlined deployment process and proactive customer support, allowing for faster and more effective implementation.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco Secure Workload's higher initial setup cost and complex pricing structure can impact ROI, making it a less attractive option for cost-conscious enterprises. Nutanix Flow Network Security offers a straightforward pricing model and quicker deployment, leading to potentially higher and faster ROI, making it more appealing due to overall cost-efficiency.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Secure Workload vs. Nutanix Flow Network Security Report (Updated: October 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Workload vs. Nutanix Flow Network Security

October 2024

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Helped 814,649 peers since 2012

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Secure Workload

Ranking in Microsegmentation Software

5th

Average Rating

8.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud and Data Center Security (8th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (16th), Cisco Security Portfolio (9th)

Nutanix Flow Network Security

Ranking in Microsegmentation Software

4th

Average Rating

9.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the Microsegmentation Software category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Workload is 10.2%, down from 15.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Nutanix Flow Network Security is 8.2%, up from 8.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Microsegmentation Software

Featured Reviews

Raj Metkar

Director, Head of Networks at MUFG Bank EMEA and Securities International

Sep 6, 2024

Discover internal application dependencies and create a dependency map

We actively seek improvements in integrating the Infoblox DDI platform with Cisco Secure Workload. This integration allows Cisco Secure Workload to learn about our networks and network tags, providing valuable insights into vulnerabilities related to the operating system and various applications installed on our servers. Recently, Cisco announced a new product called HyperShield, an AI-based autonomous micro-segmentation solution. While Cisco has not stated that HyperShield will replace Cisco Secure Workload, it represents a natural evolution for the company. HyperShield features dynamic policy discovery and enforcement; however, once policies are enforced, they do not change until a discovery occurs, requiring a re-enforcement process. This new platform operates autonomously, minimizing the need for user or security engineer intervention. I would have expected Cisco to incorporate more automatic discovery and enforcement features within the existing Cisco Secure Workload product. Instead of enhancing the current product, they have introduced a new solution. Cisco plans to honor existing Tetration licenses, allowing users to transition to HyperShield without additional costs, reflecting the investment enterprises have already made. From Cisco’s perspective, this represents a natural progression in their product line. While the product name changes, it seems more of a rebranding effort. The enhancements are greater autonomy, improved discovery, and automatic enforcement, which are now being introduced in HyperShield. Cisco Secure Workload offers automatic policy enforcement but cannot adjust policies dynamically as the application needs to change. Having used the platform for the past five years, the recent announcement has been reassuring. Cisco has confirmed that our investment in the platform will not go to waste. They will honor our existing licenses, providing a natural migration path to the new solution without any disruption

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Gus Thompson

IT Principal Analyst at Pima Community College

Mar 1, 2024

Offers great integration capabilities and helps design a disaster recovery plan

My company is still determining how the product has improved network visibility. My organization is still actively developing the product. There are many things my company is doing in the background to make sure that our VMs come up. My company deals with Nutanix Cross Hypervisor Disaster Recovery, so we are moving from an ESXi or VMware to Nutanix AHV, meaning that my company is crossing over from hypervisor technologies and leveraging Nutanix to maintain the networks at our DR facility. The most valuable feature of the product in enhancing the security posture stems from the micro-segmentation provided by the product, but I think that it is a functionality in its early stages. The product's micro-segmentation features are being developed to be made robust against technologies such as NSX from VMware and other hypervisor-dependent technologies such as Guardicore. I can't say that the product has given my company any additional features yet, but we hope that the tool will provide us with additional functionalities in the future. The product's micro-segmentation features seem to be on par with the other technologies in the market when it comes to its ability to isolate workloads. I haven't noticed any improvements in my company due to the automation capabilities of the product, especially since everything is done manually in our organization because we know the application very well, and we also know how we want to protect it. I am sure the product has automatic features, but we haven't used them in our company. There has been a positive impact due to the integration capabilities of the product with the other solutions in our company's IT infrastructure. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it, especially those who use Nutanix AHV as a hypervisor. It would be a good choice to work with the account rep in your company so that you can get a system engineer to help you walk through the majority of the deployment and setup phases since the documentation has certain shortcomings. I rate the overall tool a ten out of ten.

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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 most valuable feature is micro-segmentation, which is the most important with respect to visibility."

"Scalability is its most valuable feature."

"The only use case I can see that makes sense is micro-segmentation. I think there are other use cases for it. The main purpose of the product is to do micro-segmentation by collecting IP. That could be done by installing an agent, and then you have all the communication coming in and out. You could also use some flow sensors installed in the network that receive a copy of the traffic and then report that back to the system."

"The solution offers 100% telemetry coverage. The telemetry you collect is not sampled, it's not intermittent. It's complete. You see everything in it, including full visibility of all activities on your endpoints and in your network."

"Generally speaking, Cisco support is considered one of the best in the networking products and stack."

"Instead of proving that all the access control lists are in place and all the EPGs are correct, we can just point the auditor to a dashboard and point out that there aren't any escaped conversations. It saves an enormous, enormous amount of time."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is that we don't have to do packet captures on the network."

"A complete and powerful micro-segmentation solution."

More Cisco Secure Workload pros

"Nutanix Flow has a lot of data protection features. It's also valuable for operations and management. It's a big solution that works well with different solutions and is suitable for most business cases."

"Flow Network Security's most valuable features are user-friendliness, the console, and policy creation."

"We appreciate the fact that this solution allows us to segregate two virtual machines that are in the same cluster."

"It is a very stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."

"Nutanix Flow Network Security is a simple solution that is usable, easy to understand, and easy to deploy."

"Nutanix Flow is straightforward to install. You only need to select a checkmark that you want to enable Nutanix Flow."

"They also introduced that they develop API first and the rest follows."

"It allows for policies that enable complete visibility and traffic control."

More Nutanix Flow Network Security pros

Cons

"There was a controversy when Cisco reduced the amount of data they kept, and the solution became quite cost-intensive, which made its adoption challenging….Although they have modified it now, I preferred the previous version, and I wish all the functionality were back under the same product."

"The integration could be better, especially with different types of solutions."

"They should scale down the hardware a bit. The initial hardware investment is two million dollars so it's a price point problem. The issue with the price comes from the fact that you have to have it with enormous storage and enormous computes."

"It is highly scalable, but there is a limitation that it is only available on Cisco devices."

"It is not so easy to use and configure. It needs a bunch of further resources to work, which is mainly the biggest downside of it. The deployment is huge."

"There is some overlap between Cisco Tetration and AppDynamics and I need to have a single pane of glass, rather than have to jump between different tools."

"Secure Workload is a little complicated to use, and the dashboard isn't intuitive, so it takes a while to learn how to use it."

"The multi-tenancy, redundancy, backup and restore functionalities, as well as the monitoring aspects of the solution, need improvement. The solution offers virtually no enterprise-grade possibility for monitoring."

More Cisco Secure Workload cons

"For customers who are running Nutanix Flow and AHV, the largest area for improvement is in the disaster recovery environments. To automate the populate of rules from one side to the other side in case of disaster you report everything on the disaster recovery site, and you have all the rules automatically applied. This was something that was being built when I left Nutanix. It might already be available. Additionally, the usability of the rules editor could improve."

"I would rate Flow Network Security's stability seven out of ten - it could be improved."

"While the graphical interface of Nutanix Flow Network Security could have been improved, and some of the reporting features needed extra work, the product's features were similar to VMware's NSX. The difference lay more in the presentation and user interface."

"The most difficult part is the configuration of the initial blueprints."

"Nutanix Flow's networking features could use some improvement. Also, I don't know if it's currently supporting load balancing or not."

"The documentation offered by the product is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."

"The solution’s pricing could be improved."

"We would like the reporting functionality of this solution to be improved."

More Nutanix Flow Network Security cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is outrageous. If you have money to throw at the product, then do it."

"Pricing depends on the scope of the application and the features. Larger installations save more."

"The price is based on how many computers you're going to install it on."

"The cost for the hardware is around 300k."

"Regarding price, Cisco Secure Workload can be expensive if you don't have a budget. If you're not doing micro-segmentation, every extra security measure or enforcement you're putting on top of your existing environment will be an extra cost. It's not a cheap solution at all. But from my point of view, if you need to do micro-segmentation, this is one of the best tools I've seen for it. I can't compare that to Microsoft's solution because I haven't looked into it. I've looked into VMware and Cisco. Those are the only two that I know of. I didn't know that Microsoft could do micro-segmentation at all. Maybe they can, but I haven't heard anything about it."

"It is not cheap and pricing may limit scalability."

"The pricing is a bit higher than we anticipated."

"There is an annual subscription to use this solution. There is a 60-day trial to use the solution, it gives you time to decide if you want to continue using the solution."

"Flow Network Security is available on a three-year license, with annual renewals of the maintenance fee."

"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten."

"In comparison to other options available in the market, I would rate their pricing as very competitive, probably a two or three out of ten for cost."

"This model is very accessible to implement."

"The product is available for free use."

"There are different licensing models."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

29%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

25%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Secure Workload?

The product provides multiple-device integration.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Workload?

CloudStrike offers antivirus capabilities and firewall features for servers and VDI but lacks automatic policy discovery. This raises questions about the resources required to discover and write po...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Workload?

See all answers

What do you like most about Nutanix Flow?

Nutanix Flow Network Security is a simple solution that is usable, easy to understand, and easy to deploy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nutanix Flow?

There are different models like Nutanix AOS Pro or Ultimate license. The prices are different, but it's not in the same price range as Cisco ACI, for example.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Nutanix Flow?

Last time I used it, it was not handy to see or to analyze traffic logs. As a Check Point partner as well, we have some more expectations to log in. Probably, it's possible to forward all the traff...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 20% of the time

Illumio vs Cisco Secure Workload

Compared 20% of the time

Cisco ACI vs Cisco Secure Workload

Compared 12% of the time

VMware NSX vs Cisco Secure Workload

Compared 12% of the time

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs Cisco Secure Workload

Compared 9% of the time

More Cisco Secure Workload Competitors

VMware NSX vs Nutanix Flow Network Security

Compared 83% of the time

Akamai Guardicore Segmentation vs Nutanix Flow Network Security

Compared 7% of the time

Illumio vs Nutanix Flow Network Security

Compared 7% of the time

Meraki SD-WAN vs Nutanix Flow Network Security

Compared 2% of the time

More Nutanix Flow Network Security Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Workload

November 2024

Download Cisco Secure Workload product report

Buyer's Guide

Nutanix Flow Network Security

October 2024

Download Nutanix Flow Network Security product report

Also Known As

Cisco Tetration

Nutanix Flow Microsegmentation

Learn More

Cisco

Nutanix

Overview

Cisco Secure Workload is a cloud and data security solution that offers a zero-trust policy of keeping an organization’s application workloads safe and secure throughout the entire on-premise and cloud data center ecosystems.

Cisco Secure Workload will consistently provide protection by discovering workload process anomalies, stopping threats immediately, minimizing the risk threat surface, and aborting any lateral movement.

Today’s ecosystems are very elastic, and in the application-focused dynamic of today’s aggressive marketplace, Cisco Secure Workload delivers a robust security solution that works effectively with today’s most popular applications. The solution uniquely surrounds each and every workload to ensure organizations are able to keep their data, network, and applications safe and secure at all times. Cisco Secure Workload ensures that enterprise organizations can maintain secure applications by consistently building firewalls around every workload level throughout the entire ecosystem. The solution can manage applications that are deployed on containers, virtual machines, or bare-metal servers.

Cisco Secure workload is able to meet an organization's busy needs and offers flexible options such as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and on-premises options. Using the Secure Workload SaaS options, users receive all the benefits of Cisco Secure Workload protection without the hassle of having to deploy and maintain the platform on premises. Users are responsible for acquiring the necessary software licensing and deploying software agents. Using SaaS, Secure Workload runs in the cloud and is operated and maintained by Cisco. This option offers the ability to scale easily and is a popular choice for SaaS-first and SaaS-only clients. Many organizations find they get the best TCO and achieve the best productivity and profitability using the SaaS options.

When choosing on-premises options, organizations choose between hardware-based appliance models (large or small form factors). Platform selection is dependent on scalability goals, the desired fidelity level of flow telemetry, and the actual number of workloads. When a user chooses to configure Cisco Secure Workload for a conversation-only flow telemetry for all workloads, each platform has the capability to scale up vertically twice the default platform scale. Additionally, with Secure Workload, it is possible for the platform to be scaled horizontally in order to satisfy the demands of extra large widely distributed enterprise environments using federation capabilities.

Cisco Secure Workload also provides a robust disaster recovery (DR) tool, which helps to make it a complete, comprehensive solution. The DR allows for continuous restore and backup capabilities that enable users to quickly remediate operations and data to a standby cluster in the event of a drastic failure or disaster.

Reviews from Real Users

“The solution offers 100% telemetry coverage. The telemetry you collect is not sampled, it's not intermittent. It's complete. You see everything in it, including full visibility of all activities on your endpoints and in your network. Other valuable features include vast support for annotations, flexible user applications, machine learning, automatic classification, and hierarchical policies.” - CTO at a tech vendor

Flow Network Security is a stateful, distributed, microsegmentation firewall. It is provided as part of NCI Ultimate or as part of the optional Security Add-On package for NCI Pro.

Sample Customers

ADP, University of North Carolina Charlotte (UNCC)

JetBlue, International Speedway Corporation, Volkswagen SAIC, Brighton and Hove City Council, Foresters Financial, Janus International Group, Cloud Comrade, Serco

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Workload vs. Nutanix Flow Network Security

October 2024

Free Report: Cisco Secure Workload vs. Nutanix Flow Network Security

Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Workload vs. Nutanix Flow Network Security and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.

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