February 26, 2010 -- In a deal that flew under the radar, SGI announced this week that it has purchased what is left of defunct virtual tape library (VTL) vendor Copan Systems for a price of about $2 million – that's right – $2 million.
SGI gobbled up Copan's assets in a private foreclosure sale from Copan's secured creditors. SGI did not assume any debt of Copan in the acquisition and assumed a limited number of liabilities.
Copan's claim to fame was its energy-efficient Enterprise MAID (Massive Array of Idle Disks) technology for long-term storage of persistent data and its ability to power down disk drives when not in use.
"In my mind, they were a bit of a one-trick pony in that they had a purpose-built platform that incorporated MAID with drive spin-down," says Forrester Research senior analyst Andrew Reichman.
According to Reichman's research, the power benefits didn't match to cost of the system.
"It didn't take off because the power cost of 100TB of storage is about 1% of acquiring that 100TB. It's a drop in the bucket," he says. "What's more, most of the data center buyers are different than the facilities team and therefore don't pay the power bill. That put a barrier in place."
The surprising piece of this puzzle is the price tag. Two million seems a bit low for a company that raised more than $100 million in five rounds of funding, the most recent of which came about a year ago. That's a lot of money lost for Copan's investors.
Reichman believes SGI bought Copan at a bargain basement price in the hopes of using the technology down the line.
Copan's offices in Longmont, Colo., will be retained, and SGI "intends to hire select Copan employees," according to the company.
Reichman thinks Copan customers should start thinking about migrating their data.
"I've talked to customers and, not surprisingly, they're concerned. It's a bad situation to be in. I hate to leave gear with usable life on the table, but my message to [users] is to start with a migration plan now to move off of the [platform]," he says.
SGI's CEO, Mark J. Barrenechea, outlined its plans for the Copan technology earlier this week in a letter to customers on the SGI website. Barrenechea wrote:
"The Copan assets will allow us to provide our customers access to Copan's approach to data backup, recovery, and active archive. Copan products are based on an Enterprise MAID (Massive Array of Idle Disks) platform, which is ideally suited of solutions like Virtual Tape Libraries (VTL), Disk-to-Disk (D2D) backup and HSM (Hierarchical Storage Management). When integrated into the SGI InfiniteStorage Total Control Suite with software like DMF and LiveArc, as well as our high performance NAS, SAN and bulk storage solutions, SGI has increased the ability of our customers to fully exploit the value of their data."
Are you a Copan customer? Sound off! Drop us a line with your questions or concerns.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Friday, February 19, 2010
Cisco-HP partnership implodes
February 19, 2010 -- Months of rumored bad blood between Cisco and HP has finally boiled over as InfoStor has learned that Cisco Systems will not renew its System Integrator contract with HP.
Citing "changes in the IT landscape and the evolving role of the network and the implications to our partnering strategy with HP," Keith Goodwin, senior vice president of Cisco's Worldwide Partner Organization, said Cisco recently notified HP that it will not renew its System Integrator contract when it expires on April 30, 2010, resulting in HP no longer being a Cisco Certified Channel or Global Service Alliance partner.
The statement was made in a video blog posted on Cisco's website late last night and appears to be the result of a flurry of activity sparked by John Furrier's siliconAngle blog yesterday morning.
Upon reading John's blog, I fired off questions to both Cisco and HP. While Cisco did not respond directly to my questions, it's safe to say Goodwin answered them – and then some – in his video missive.
Goodwin went on to say "[Cisco is] taking this action to be transparent to both partners and customers – we will compete with HP for future business."
HP supplied me with a written statement late yesterday. However, in all fairness, they had yet to see Goodwin's blog on Cisco.com.
HP's statement is as follows:
"History has proven that customers and the market demand both co-opetition and collaboration between IT vendors. Most major players compete in one deal, and partner in others to best serve the client's needs. We do not believe it is in the customer's best interest to take a proprietary stance.
We will provide clients with consulting, integration, management and support services for their heterogeneous environments and ensure that our hardware and software platforms are optimized for all leading networking platforms.
Our strategy and platforms will continue to be market driven to create advantage today and into the future for our clients."
So what does this mean for customers?
Goodwin said Cisco has reached out to HP to start discussing a "new agreement that ensures business continuity for existing customers and better reflects the current state of our relationship."
He also maintained that Cisco will honor existing customer service contracts with HP for their duration.
"Our commitment is clear: we will continue to work with HP wherever our customers expect it and where it makes sense for our business," he said.
A brief history of the HP-Cisco shadow war
Cisco seems to have started this tussle with its entry into the server market in March 2009 with the debut of Cisco's Unified Computing System (UCS), which combines compute, network, storage access, and virtualization resources in a single system based on a new line of blade servers developed by Cisco.
Cisco's move into the server market caused some waves across the industry and left many partners – most notably HP – with a lot of questions.
Cisco added to the UCS platform last October with the launch of UCS rack-mount servers, memory extension technology, and a line of converged network adapters (CNAs).
Subsequently, HP made some big moves of its own. Last November, the company put its own twist on unified computing with the announcement of the HP Converged Infrastructure Architecture and a set of associated services and partner offerings that create a virtualized, on-demand data center.
HP then added to its own arsenal with the $2.7 billion to acquisition of networking vendor 3Com, as HP continued on its path toward data center convergence.
The latest move from HP was yesterday's announcement of a new deal with QLogic, under which HP will is now selling QLogic's 5800V and 5802V Series stackable 8Gbps Fibre Channel switches.
What's your take on this whole mess? Drop us a line: kevink@pennwell.com.
Citing "changes in the IT landscape and the evolving role of the network and the implications to our partnering strategy with HP," Keith Goodwin, senior vice president of Cisco's Worldwide Partner Organization, said Cisco recently notified HP that it will not renew its System Integrator contract when it expires on April 30, 2010, resulting in HP no longer being a Cisco Certified Channel or Global Service Alliance partner.
The statement was made in a video blog posted on Cisco's website late last night and appears to be the result of a flurry of activity sparked by John Furrier's siliconAngle blog yesterday morning.
Upon reading John's blog, I fired off questions to both Cisco and HP. While Cisco did not respond directly to my questions, it's safe to say Goodwin answered them – and then some – in his video missive.
Goodwin went on to say "[Cisco is] taking this action to be transparent to both partners and customers – we will compete with HP for future business."
HP supplied me with a written statement late yesterday. However, in all fairness, they had yet to see Goodwin's blog on Cisco.com.
HP's statement is as follows:
"History has proven that customers and the market demand both co-opetition and collaboration between IT vendors. Most major players compete in one deal, and partner in others to best serve the client's needs. We do not believe it is in the customer's best interest to take a proprietary stance.
We will provide clients with consulting, integration, management and support services for their heterogeneous environments and ensure that our hardware and software platforms are optimized for all leading networking platforms.
Our strategy and platforms will continue to be market driven to create advantage today and into the future for our clients."
So what does this mean for customers?
Goodwin said Cisco has reached out to HP to start discussing a "new agreement that ensures business continuity for existing customers and better reflects the current state of our relationship."
He also maintained that Cisco will honor existing customer service contracts with HP for their duration.
"Our commitment is clear: we will continue to work with HP wherever our customers expect it and where it makes sense for our business," he said.
A brief history of the HP-Cisco shadow war
Cisco seems to have started this tussle with its entry into the server market in March 2009 with the debut of Cisco's Unified Computing System (UCS), which combines compute, network, storage access, and virtualization resources in a single system based on a new line of blade servers developed by Cisco.
Cisco's move into the server market caused some waves across the industry and left many partners – most notably HP – with a lot of questions.
Cisco added to the UCS platform last October with the launch of UCS rack-mount servers, memory extension technology, and a line of converged network adapters (CNAs).
Subsequently, HP made some big moves of its own. Last November, the company put its own twist on unified computing with the announcement of the HP Converged Infrastructure Architecture and a set of associated services and partner offerings that create a virtualized, on-demand data center.
HP then added to its own arsenal with the $2.7 billion to acquisition of networking vendor 3Com, as HP continued on its path toward data center convergence.
The latest move from HP was yesterday's announcement of a new deal with QLogic, under which HP will is now selling QLogic's 5800V and 5802V Series stackable 8Gbps Fibre Channel switches.
What's your take on this whole mess? Drop us a line: kevink@pennwell.com.
Friday, February 5, 2010
Cloud computing courses cropping up
February 5, 2010 -- UC Irvine has become the latest school to add cloud computing to its curriculum as the concept continues to gain steam in the IT industry. However, the momentum of the cloud seems to be vendor-driven as recent research shows end user customers are still hesitant or unwilling to turn storage over to the cloud.
This week, the University of California, Irvine Extension announced a new eight-week online course titled "Cloud Computing," beginning Monday, April 12. According to the school, "the course was created to arm participants with an advanced level of knowledge and hands-on experience in understanding, designing and implementing a cloud-based software system."
Specifically, the course will outline current industry techniques and practices, future challenges and survey applications deployed by Amazon, Google and Microsoft. The aim is to arm students with "an understanding of cloud computing models, techniques and architectures, and its application by providers in delivering common business functions such as data storage, computing resources and messaging online."
UC Irvine is not alone. There are a wealth of cloud computing resources and courses cropping up on the Web. UC Berkeley has the cloud on its radar and IT education companies like Stratos Learning and Plularsight also offer cloud-related courses. Not to mention the storage industry's efforts including the Storage Networking Industry Association's (SNIA) Cloud Storage Initiative.
It's no surprise that cloud technologies are finding their way into the realm of higher learning, but is the cloud phenomenon a result of industry hype or end user interest when it comes to cloud storage?
Editor-in-Chief Dave Simpson highlighted some interesting research from Forrester that points to the former. In his recent piece, "Survey: Users not very interested in cloud storage," Dave cites a Forrester survey that shows about 43% of the respondents said that they were categorically "not interested" in adopting pay-per-use hosted storage capacity. Another 43% said that they were interested but had no plans to implement cloud storage.
It's and interesting dichotomy. The storage pros aren't ready and have concerns about security, compliance and portability, but the vendors are all about the cloud.
There's too much invested in the cloud moniker to have it fall by the wayside in favor of some new flavor of the month, but the vendors may have to drag users into the cloud in the coming years, especially when it comes to entrusting their critical data to a hosted service. Regardless, having a cloud credential or two on the resume can't hurt.
For news and feature articles on cloud storage, visit InfoStor's cloud storage Topic Center.
This week, the University of California, Irvine Extension announced a new eight-week online course titled "Cloud Computing," beginning Monday, April 12. According to the school, "the course was created to arm participants with an advanced level of knowledge and hands-on experience in understanding, designing and implementing a cloud-based software system."
Specifically, the course will outline current industry techniques and practices, future challenges and survey applications deployed by Amazon, Google and Microsoft. The aim is to arm students with "an understanding of cloud computing models, techniques and architectures, and its application by providers in delivering common business functions such as data storage, computing resources and messaging online."
UC Irvine is not alone. There are a wealth of cloud computing resources and courses cropping up on the Web. UC Berkeley has the cloud on its radar and IT education companies like Stratos Learning and Plularsight also offer cloud-related courses. Not to mention the storage industry's efforts including the Storage Networking Industry Association's (SNIA) Cloud Storage Initiative.
It's no surprise that cloud technologies are finding their way into the realm of higher learning, but is the cloud phenomenon a result of industry hype or end user interest when it comes to cloud storage?
Editor-in-Chief Dave Simpson highlighted some interesting research from Forrester that points to the former. In his recent piece, "Survey: Users not very interested in cloud storage," Dave cites a Forrester survey that shows about 43% of the respondents said that they were categorically "not interested" in adopting pay-per-use hosted storage capacity. Another 43% said that they were interested but had no plans to implement cloud storage.
It's and interesting dichotomy. The storage pros aren't ready and have concerns about security, compliance and portability, but the vendors are all about the cloud.
There's too much invested in the cloud moniker to have it fall by the wayside in favor of some new flavor of the month, but the vendors may have to drag users into the cloud in the coming years, especially when it comes to entrusting their critical data to a hosted service. Regardless, having a cloud credential or two on the resume can't hurt.
For news and feature articles on cloud storage, visit InfoStor's cloud storage Topic Center.
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