Classify branches before you buy circuits
Three branch profiles cover most enterprises: transaction branches (small, latency-sensitive, low bandwidth), service branches (medium, mixed voice and data), and flagship branches (heavy applications, video, Wi-Fi). Trying to serve all three with one circuit design is why connectivity budgets bloat. Profile first, then let each profile pick its own mix of MPLS, fibre, and wireless backup.
Where SD-WAN pays, where MPLS stays
SD-WAN’s win is path control: application-aware routing across cheaper circuits, with sub-second failover that hides last-mile flaps. For inter-branch application traffic it routinely replaces the second MPLS circuit. What it does not replace is the regulated core — branch-to-core transaction paths at banks stay on MPLS for compliance and deterministic latency, with SD-WAN as the active backup and the internet-breakout lane.
The pattern that works
The steady state most Bangladeshi financial institutions land on: MPLS for the transaction path, SD-WAN over dual broadband for everything else, zero-touch provisioning so a branch manager can bring a site up without an engineer visit. That combination typically cuts per-branch circuit cost by a third while improving measured availability.
