VPN providers: how to overcome scalability issues and expand globally efficiently

VPN providers must be able to scale quickly and efficiently to accommodate new users, generate positive reviews, and maximize revenue. But up until this point, rapidly scaling a VPN while satisfying current users has proven to be both costly and complex — putting providers at a disadvantage.

To thrive in today’s competitive market, VPN providers must rethink their approach to scaling altogether. Read on to learn why the traditional way of scaling a VPN is no longer effective, and how to streamline the process by leveraging private edge compute and networking services from a provider like Zenlayer.

Why it’s hard to scale a VPN service

Scaling your VPN operations to satisfy a growing user base can be a logistical nightmare. This is because the traditional approach requires selecting one of the following options:

· Scaling up vertically by upgrading and replacing your servers to the latest specs

· Scaling out horizontally by adding more servers to your current infrastructure

Both options are expensive, time-consuming, and come with additional maintenance requirements. And they are especially difficult for providers dealing with budgetary and staffing restraints.

VPN providers may also run into additional challenges when trying to scale into emerging markets throughout high-growth areas like China, Southeast Asia, and Latin America. On one hand, emerging markets offer massive growth potential for VPNs. For example, Indonesia now has the highest VPN usage globally with 55% of residents being VPN users. Other popular countries for VPN usage include India (43%), the UAE, Thailand, and Malaysia, among others. But reaching these customers in such markets can prove to be challenging due to heavy regulatory barriers, connectivity gaps, a lack of infrastructure, and higher operating costs.

How to efficiently scale VPN and better serve global customers

Instead of upgrading, replacing, or adding more servers to your environment, it’s far easier to work with a third-party VPN infrastructure provider like Zenlayer offering private compute and networking services at the edge of the network — meaning close to end-users in local markets.

Rather than shuffling a large amount of capital and waiting months to build out additional infrastructure, this approach can help you get the job done in a fraction of the costs and time. The result is immediate, on-demand access to global compute and networking resources wherever you need them.

Why work with a VPN infrastructure provider?

Here are some additional reasons to consider working with a VPN infrastructure provider with global reach and premium network and compute offerings.

Simplify management

Working with a VPN provider can make it easy to manage global infrastructure from a central location.

For example, Zenlayer’s user-friendly zenConsole lets you provision edge compute and networking solutions within minutes, enabling you to instantly allocate resources and add capacity wherever you need it.

Enhance privacy and security

Using bare metal and virtual machines (VM) can help you beef up the security of your VPN service.

Zenlayer leverages Intel’s AES-NI-based hardware which accelerates secure data encryption and decryption, meaning all servers and network connections can be encrypted at rest and in transit to keep user traffic private end-to-end.

Additionally, deploying compute at the edge drastically shortens the distance between where user traffic originates and your VPN server, minimizing the chances of interceptions, intrusions, and other malicious acts.

Furthermore, your VPN service likely deals with highly sensitive user data that often include identity and financial information, login credentials, and online activity history. Using private networking solutions can shield that data from unauthorized access and prying eyes by providing a secure and isolated environment for your VPN traffic.

Improve performance and stability

A VPN infrastructure provider can provide expertise and partnerships in various regions around the world, making it far easier to ensure performance and stability in overseas markets.

Zenlayer offers a high-performance global network with a blend of the best local carriers. In addition, the company provides more than 5,400 peers and over 290 edge nodes across 50 countries on six continents, ensuring that traffic travels the most direct route. This leads to faster transmission speeds, and greater responsiveness for end users.

What’s more, Zenlayer’s edge compute solutions further improve responsiveness and lower latency by placing resources physically closer to where global users are. Customers can also add load balancing solutions to distribute peak-hour traffic across multiple nearby VPN servers to ensure maximum service availability.

Reduce time for maintenance

Maintaining VPN infrastructure can be costly and time-consuming, especially if your service employs many servers spread out across multiple locations.

By leveraging Zenlayer’s edge compute products, you can quickly deploy a highly distributed network that is both easy to monitor and painless to manage. Plus, when your infrastructure is hosted in edge bare metal or VMs on Zenlayer’s massive global network, you won’t need to worry about fixing, updating, or replacing physical hardware. This also helps you free up resources in funds and personnel that would otherwise go into on-site maintenance and repairs.

Improve operating cost-efficiency

Yet another reason to work with a VPN infrastructure provider like Zenlayer is that you can access flexible pricing.

Although you have the option to pay a flat fee for bandwidth, Zenlayer also offers monthly aggregate bandwidth and data transfer pricing. If you go with aggregate bandwidth, we group together your servers and bill you for all their combined bandwidth caps. If you prefer data transfer, we bill you for the total amount of bandwidth used across all your servers.

Aggregate bandwidth pricing helps you balance between underutilized and overutilized servers to eliminate bandwidth waste and make the most of your bandwidth spend. Data transfer, on the other hand, lets you pay for what you use.

In addition, our 95% burstable billing model for aggregate bandwidth gives you the flexibility to not overcommit to more expensive bandwidth caps. By sampling your bandwidth usage over the month and trimming the top 5%, or peak bandwidth use, you can rest easy knowing that momentary, unexpected traffic spikes that burst through your bandwidth cap are less likely to incur overage fees.

Scale your VPN service with Zenlayer

While it’s impossible to avoid all expansion challenges, Zenlayer’s expertise, advanced compute and networking solutions, and 24/7 live support team can take most of the pain out of growing your VPN service.

For further reading, check out Zenlayer’s Bare Metal Cloud product page or learn about Zenlayer Virtual Machine. Or contact Zenlayer and schedule a free consultation.