Aviatrix wants to elevate the work of cloud networking heroes who labor to keep networks secure, effective, and performant. We’re proud to highlight people who have taught themselves the necessary skills, designed and managed successful networks, and have the expertise to share.
Our next hero spotlight is on Sevan Oranci, Network Architect. See our previous hero spotlights here.
Background: Passionate about Computers
Sevan has been passionate about computers since childhood. He decided to join the IT domain at the age of 12. He started out as a network and security engineer, managing equipment for several customers from a global service center. Later, he moved into network and security architecture.
“Today, with over 17 years of experience in designing, sizing, and deploying network solutions, I help customers understand their network connectivity issues regarding their data centers and public clouds,” he said. He also provides follow-up and design support for architectures with the BUILD/RUN teams, technically assists the pre-sales teams, and conducts technical demonstrations.
“Showing what we can do for our customers is one of my favorite activities,” he said. He also loves to be part of the presales teams as a solution architect, helping them “draw the best design, take care of the customer requirements, and manage their businesses.'
Security in the Cloud: The Visibility Challenge
Sevan has become more involved in the security aspect of networking since he moved to the cloud from legacy infrastructure. “Customers have lost the in-depth visibility they had on legacy infrastructure when they started to move their workload to public cloud,” he explained. “It was not a big deal with a few VMs, but when they started to move their core applications, they expected to have the network and security visibility into the cloud and toward the cloud. We saw that deploying legacy tools would be too expensive, so products like Aviatrix help us to mitigate the requirement.”
The Evolution of Networking and the Next Ten Years
Sevan recounted the biggest change he has faced in his career: automation in network procedures. “We have deployed many tools to automate almost all network operations, starting with day-0 to remediation in case of issues,” he said.
Cloud adoption has also created significant changes. “The move to the cloud added a new position for network engineers because all the legacy concepts had to be reviewed,” he said. “‘Where's my VLAN? Why do you have firewall rules attached to the network card? What are these routes locally managed?’ The way we built networks 15 years ago is over. Centralization of network access is over.”
In the next decade, Sevan predicts that the industry will face security issues: the current world crises (economic, political, and military) will cause an increase of security attacks. “We'll have to work on the visibility features and IA remediation,” he predicted.
The Network is the Cloud: The Airplane in the Sky Between Cities
“For me, 'Network is the Cloud’ is like airplane in the sky between cities,” Sevan said. “We need to be able to move data from point A to point B, secure it and measure it. The network is therefore a keystone to any IT system, even in a public cloud. It can be a ‘spaghetti dish’ if not well designed and maintained.”
Outside of Work
Outside of work, Sevan likes to stay active. “Over a year ago, and seeing the years go by, I wanted to get back into sports,” he said. “So I chose running and started my first 5 km session in April 2024. I coughed, sweated, and collapsed on the couch for 2 hours.”
Sevan decide to invest in physical conditioning by setting a goal to run a half-marathon in March 2025. He succeeded and completed the marathon in less than 2 hours and 20 minutes.
“I continue my activity and have a lot of other half marathons in 2025, with the target to go below 2 hours,” he said.
Curious about other cloud networking heroes like Sevan?
We’ll keep highlighting networking professionals on this blog.
Learn more about the Cloud Networking Heroes program on The Cloud Network Community.
