Software giant Microsoft announced a series of new partnerships at its Worldwide Partner Conference 2010 in Washington, D.C., on Monday, putting HP in the spotlight. HP will become the primary supplier of hardware for Microsoft’s private-cloud version of the Windows Azure platform. To that end, the two companies have jointly developed an appliance that enables the platform’s deployment.
The appliance is Microsoft-specified hardware with Windows Azure and Microsoft SQL Azure. According to Microsoft, customers who deploy the appliance in their own data centers to create private clouds get the benefit of maintaining physical control of location and regulatory compliance of the data the platform processes, while using Microsoft’s existing cloud services.
“Microsoft and HP will align engineering, sales and professional services to provide enterprise customers a full range of cloud services and technologies where they want it and how they want it,” President of Microsoft’s Server and Tools Business Bob Muglia said in a statement.
“The Windows Azure platform appliance will provide customers with a turnkey solution to address new business scenarios that require rapid scaling of applications and deliver services that are predictable, immediately consumable and more cost-effective.”
Besides making the hardware for the platform, HP is one of its early adopters. Other early adopters of the limited-production release are Dell, eBay and Fujitsu. Customers may also choose to use HP data center hosting services to support manage the appliance instead of deploying it on premises.
Microsfoft says the solutiuon will enable customers to rapidly scale applications, provide new online services and migrate Windows and .NET-based applications to the cloud.
The announcement further deepens the $250m collaboration HP and Microsoft unveiled in January, describing a plan to deliver full-stack IT solution for private-cloud deployments by enterprises. The solution, pre-integrated and tested will include servers, storage, networking, virtualization platform and Microsoft applications like SQL Server or Exchange.
The offerings HP will deliver as a result of the collaboration will include data center hosting services, networking gear and ProLiant servers. The company becomes the primary infrastructure provider for the Azure platform, whereby the two companies will optimize Microsoft applications for HP’s Converged Infrastructure, which will include the aforementioned network and compute equipment as well as the option to deploy the solution in HP’s containerized data centers called Performance-Optimized Datacenters (POD’s).
HP will also deliver application modernization, migration and integration services for Windows applications.
eBay, one of the early adopters of the new Windows Azure appliance will use it to deploy its platform on a private-cloud infrastructure. Dell will use the appliance to deliver cloud services to customers and will also be working together with Microsoft to create a similar appliance powered by Dell hardware.
Fujitsu will deploy the appliance in its own data centers and will also provide it as part of its new set of cloud services and solutions that include system integration, cloud migration and managed services.
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Keywords: Microsoft, HP, HP Converged Infrastructure, Windows Azure, Azure platform appliance, private cloud, data center, Dell, eBay, Fujitsu, data center container | |
