(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Novell (www.novell.com) unveiled last week its marketing strategy of a “Service-Driven Data Center,” which includes a portfolio of integrated products that the company says it is “designed to help customers increase agility while reducing cost, complexity and risk.”
The concept is Novell’s move toward offering a more service-driven and business-centric IT services.
The Service-Driven Data Center provides solutions designed to build, manage and measure an advanced data center so IT executives can deliver cost-effective and flexible business services to their end users.
The data center vision combines SUSE Linux Enterprise 11 Server with the recently acquired PlateSpin and ManagedObjects in a portfolio of integrated products.
Released last month, Novell’s SUSE offers Linux’s open source benefits and enterprise features like Microsoft Management Tools and Xen virtual machines support, as well as the scalability to run unlimited virtual machines.
In February, SoftLayer Technologies added SUSE Linux Enterprise Server to its portfolio of server operating systems.
Novell says its solutions let customers maximize the use of their IT assets within a secure and compliant framework, whether they are running a server farm, building an internal cloud, or using an external cloud.
“We’ve talked to hundreds of customers and partners, and the one thing we’ve heard from everyone is that IT exists to meet business needs, to deliver the services that business demands,” says Jeff Jaffe, chief technology officer and executive vice president of business units at Novell. “The Service-Driven Data Center delivers an agile, cost-effective infrastructure through a combination of modular yet integrated solutions for enterprise Linux, virtualization and workload management, and business service management.”
The Service-Driven Data Center is designed to work in a heterogeneous environment, using management and automation tools to measure performance of a complete IT service against business objectives.
Novell’s vision is built around the characteristics of Build, Manage, and Measure. Build represents the company’s focus on building a highly effective and flexible data center using the SUSE Linux Enterprise 11 platform.
The Manage characteristic related to Novell’s holistic approach to virtualization and workload management using PlateSpin Workload Management solutions to leverage all of an organization’s assets.
Finally, the Measure characteristic refers to business service management using ManagedObjects, which works across multiple platforms and hardware types.
The unveiling of Novell’s data center vision comes at a time when many of the industry’s heavyweights are announcing key strategic moves in an effort to gain a competitive edge in the highly lucrative data center market.
Last month, Cisco revealed its new data center strategy, Unified Computing System, which unites compute, network, storage access, and virtualization resources in a single energy efficient system.
More recently, Sun Microsystems rejected a $7 billion acquisition offer from IBM, which would have likely improved its servers, storage and software offerings to compete with rivals such as Hewlett-Packard.
