🥇IT giants presented a joint solution for deploying hybrid clouds

Dell and VMware are integrating the VMware Cloud Foundation and VxRail platforms.

Why is this needed?

According to the State of Cloud survey, already 58% of companies are using hybrid cloud. Last year, this figure was 51%. On average, an organization 'holds in the cloud' about five different services. Meanwhile, the implementation of hybrid clouds is a priority for 45% of companies. Among organizations that already use hybrid infrastructure, notable examples include SEGA, the University of Oxford, and the analytics organization ING Financial.

The increase in cloud environments complicates infrastructure. Therefore, the main task for the IT community now is becomes to create services that simplify working with multi-cloud environments. One of the companies developing in this direction is VMware.

At the end of last year, the IT giant acquired the startup Heptio, which promotes tools for deploying Kubernetes. Last week, it became known that VMware is launching a joint solution with Dell. This involves a system for creating hybrid cloud environments based on the Dell EMC VxRail hyper-converged system and the VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) platform.

What is known about the new product

VMware has updated its cloud stack VMware Cloud Foundation to version 3.7. From April this year, the solution will be pre-installed on the Dell VxRail hyper-converged system. The new platform—VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail—will provide APIs that connect Dell networking devices (such as switches and routers) with the software components of VCF.

The VCF architecture includes vSphere server virtualization software and the vSAN storage creation system. It also incorporates NSX Data Center technology, designed to optimize and manage virtual data center networks. The capabilities of NSX have been tested in the Baystate Health hospital in England. According to the IT specialists at the hospital, the system enabled a high level of integration of all software and hardware resources, as well as drivers. Another component of VMware Cloud Foundation is the hybrid cloud management platform vRealize Suite. It

includes tools for analyzing the performance of the virtual infrastructure, assessing costs for cloud resources, monitoring, and troubleshooting. includes tools for analyzing the performance of virtual infrastructure, assessing cloud resource costs, monitoring, and troubleshooting.

Regarding VxRail, it consists of Dell PowerEdge servers. One device can support up to two hundred virtual machines. If needed, servers can be clustered together to work with 3,000 VMs simultaneously.

In the future, the solutions are planned to be developed as a unified system — for this, Dell and VMware will synchronize updates of VxRail products and VMware Cloud Foundation.

What does the community think?

According to words Representatives of VMware believe that the updated integrated platform significantly increases the performance of hybrid IT infrastructure — by 60% compared to the old version of VxRail. Additionally, VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail will reduce companies' costs for creating a cloud infrastructure. Its operational cost over five years will be 45% lower, than that of a public cloud.

One of the main advantages systems of Dell and VMware is the automation of configuration and management of physical network devices. However, analysts see potential problems that IT giants may face. Perhaps the main one is high competition. In recent years, the companies have entered many new markets (including HCI, SDN, and SD-WAN), where major players are already operating. For further growth, IT giants need new features that will favorably distinguish their solutions from competitors.

One such direction could be machine learning technologies for data center management, which Dell and VMware are already implementing in their products.

/ фото Global Access Point PD

Similar systems

Hyperconverged systems for hybrid cloud are also being developed by NetApp and Nutanix. The former offers a system for creating a private cloud with an integrated Data Fabric platform that connects on-premise infrastructure with public cloud services. The product is also based on VMware technologies, for example, vRealize.

A distinctive feature of the solution is separate nodes of servers for computing and storage. According to company representatives, this structure of infrastructure helps data centers allocate resources more efficiently and avoid overpaying for unnecessary equipment.

Nutanix also creates a platform for managing hybrid cloud environments. For example, the organization has a system for configuring and monitoring IoT systems as well as a tool for working with Kubernetes containers.

Overall, an increasing number of hyper-converged infrastructure providers are entering the multi-cloud systems market. This trend is expected to continue in the near future. In particular, the joint solution from Dell and VMware will soon the optional status of Paint and WordPad. These two programs are among the oldest, and it seems they will be installable or removable independently, just like any other applications. be part of a larger project, Project Dimension, which will integrate cloud systems with edge computing devices and on-premise equipment.

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