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An excellent, stable and scalable solution for remote users mangement
April 14, 2022

An excellent, stable and scalable solution for remote users mangement

Rodrigo Avila | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Cisco AnyConnect

In our case, the Cisco AnyConnect tool is used to establish a secure connection between remote users and the company's central infrastructure. In recent years, this use has become widespread since most users work remotely to some extent and, therefore, need to access local resources within the company. That's the field in which the Cisco AnyConnect tool has proven efficient at keeping remote users connected.
  • Get remote users connected
  • Provide user monitorization
  • Troubleshooting users issues
  • Easy and controlled update methods
  • Fail over methods for critical users
  • Features that interact with applications and the operating system
  • Have a more user-friendly front end
  • Remote control feature if needed by users for troubleshooting purposes
  • 90% of users are currently working remotely, using a reliable and stable tool.
  • Occupancy in office buildings has been reduced by 40% due to remote and/or hybrid users. Reducing expenses in maintenance, cleaning, and real estate expenses.
The end-user experience, especially with users who are not very tech-savvy and are used to directly accessing their applications, is very good with Cisco AnyConnect. They connect to the VPN only by entering their credentials, and then they can access the applications they work with. Leaving the tool running in the background without even noticing its presence, which is ultimately desirable in a tool of this type. The two qualities that are desired from the end-user are transparency and simplicity, and from the management perspective, control and security. In both cases, the Cisco AnyConnect tool meets those goals. Maybe a portable version could have been developed to make the end user's experience even easier.
The company has greatly benefited from the virtues offered by Cisco AnyConnect, since this tool offers and exceeds the necessary functionalities to maintain a universe of remote workers, with a minimal learning curve for users, and only by installing the client on machines that users already owned. There is great versatility since there are versions of the application for each operating system, being a great advantage in organizations with different terminals. In our case, we use Windows, Mac, and Linux, although there are also versions for Android and IOS.
During the implementation of the solution, the Cisco team is always present and ready, from the initial planning to the final deployment. Once up and running, the system is quite stable. In general, inconveniences could arise when making a general change takes centralized changes to be done, and then assistance from Cisco support is required, which will be provided without further delay and with great professionalism. Local problems could also arise related to the client's installation on remote users' machines. Most are due to each user's home network issues, over which there is no control, but initial troubleshooting is, nevertheless, mandatory. This last fact makes it necessary to have some diagnostic method. Then it becomes important to have the DART (Diagnostics and Reporting Tool) functionality, which is functionality included in the Cisco AnyConnect client. It is useful to perform this task and be able to resolve local problems or problems related to inconveniences with the home network by gathering information that allows determining the reported problem cause. It turned out to be a great tool since it can perform remote diagnoses.
We used to use the Pulse Secure app as a VPN client, but it was rarely used and distributed among our users due to the license's cost. And there was also little need for users to connect remotely. We switched to Cisco AnyConnect as a technology replacement due to brand recognition, pricing, and support offered. Also, because the service became critical as there are many users depending on this solution to be able to fulfill their obligations, we needed a reliable and scalable application.

Do you think Cisco AnyConnect delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Cisco AnyConnect's feature set?

Yes

Did Cisco AnyConnect live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Cisco AnyConnect go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Cisco AnyConnect again?

Yes

Citrix Workspace, Genesys Cloud CX (formerly Genesys Cloud)
The Cisco AnyConnect tool proved to be extremely helpful in keeping remote end-users connected efficiently. It also provides functionalities to configure each scenario according to the type of network used and also certain characteristics that allow a diagnosis in case of problems. The centralized administration of the connected clients also allows monitoring and payload control and makes accurate reports to keep track of the operation for future corrections. Despite the virtues shown to work with remote users, it does not seem to be an appropriate solution for systems requiring high performance or in real-time requirements scenarios since redundancy is difficult to implement.