Case Study: Stearns Bank achieves secure, compliant 90 MB SD‑WAN connectivity for real‑time backups with Ecessa

Stearns Bank, based in the Midwest, specializes in small business lending and equipment financing, overcomes limited telco bandwidth options by creating a hybrid network with Ecessa’s SD-WAN technology

Stearns Bank, a $1.9 billion financial services company, needed more secure bandwidth after installing a hyper‑converged data center to enable real‑time backups. One data center was stuck on a bonded T1 (~3 MB) and regulatory/privacy rules prevented simply adding unsecured public internet, so Stearns turned to Ecessa and its WANworX SD‑WAN solution to solve the capacity and compliance challenge.

Ecessa deployed WANworX, diagnosed carrier peering problems with Stearns and their consultants, and helped add a better‑peered ISP; effective encrypted throughput rose to about 90 MB (up from ~3 MB, with interim tests showing ~24 MB due to peering). The Ecessa solution delivered usable, secure bandwidth, enabled real‑time backups, disaster recovery testing and database sharing, and provided monitoring/reporting so Stearns Bank could meet OCC/FFIEC guidelines while restoring productivity.

Stearns Bank

Jeff Nelson

Sr. Network Infrastructure Engineer