Why do I need WAN Optimization for my wide area network?

http://www.4bridgeworks.com/wan-optimization/
Why do I need WAN Optimization for my wide area network?
The one thing about WAN optimization to keep in the rear of your minds is that it can't replicate the speed of light - it is what it is - wide area network optimization can easily make a 2mb connection seem like a 10mb connection.

If you're transferring files in between short ranges, WAN optimization isn’t going to help. You need latency between the two sites. Once you plug in the technology, everyone is going to notice you did something positive if they experience latency problems.

Any wide area network can be optimized. Furthermore, the further away or the worse the performance is at that isolated site, the greater effect WAN optimization can have on its overall performance.

Fundamentally WAN optimization delivers local area network like performance over a WAN. So if you have remote individuals at another site or on-the-move, WAN optimization will help deliver the same performance as users in your data centre would enjoy.

In a WAN there is a limit to bandwidth, dialogue between sites and latency. So what many WAN optimisation systems do is breakdown and label documents and data and deliver them up to users.

After the user has used the documents and information - and created any adjustments, the optimization software and hardware will only take notice of the modifications to the data and transfer them back to the data centre...not the information the branch office or remote location already knows the data centre has!

Possibly the biggest advantage of WAN optimization is the advantage of less “round trips” in data transfers via satellite. A WAN optimized network can cut data transfer by over 90% - meaning much less reliance upon narrow bandwidth and a lot swifter access to remote data.