Archivo de la categoría: VMware

EPP, Miscellaneous IT, VMware

You Down with VMware’s EPP? Yeah You Know Me

By: Rob O’Shaughnessy

Remember the last time you were at Chuck E. Cheese, whether you were there with your kids or by yourself (maybe you like Jasper T. Jowls rhythm guitar or you just like the pizza) and you wanted to play skee-ball or whack-a-mole.  To pay for those and the other arcade games, you didn’t just shove a dollar bill into the machine, but rather, you had to use the Chuck E. Cheese tokens.  Remember those? They were brass coins with Sir Chuck’s face on it.  You probably still have some in your change drawer next to that Canadian dollar you’ll never use.  For Chuck E. Cheese it was their own currency that you could use to purchase Chuck E. Cheese products and the more tokens you purchased the better discount you received on Chuck E. Cheese goods.  It’s a simple concept and I guess VMware must have talked to Nolan Bushnell because VMware has started their own token-based purchase program that can be used to buy VMware licensing just like a kid would use a 1000 tokens to purchase a fuzzy head troll.

VMware has always offered two licensing purchase programs that were on opposite sides of the spectrum.  There is the VPP (Volume Pricing Program) which is geared towards small to medium sized end users that requires a minimum purchase of $25K MSRP.  On the other side, VMware offers their ELA (Enterprise License Agreement) for large organizations looking to spend upwards to a million dollars or more on VMware licenses.  But what about the middle class customers who didn’t have a licensing program that provided discounts to fit their needs.  Now for those types of end users looking to spend between $250K to $1M and didn’t want to jump into an ELA and are too big for VPP, well VMware now has you covered.  Introducing the new EPP (Enterprise Purchase Program!!!).  I just rambled on about Chuck E. Cheese tokens.  Can you guess what VMware is doing?

VMware just announced their new EPP which is a purchasing program designed for mid-level end-users that offer discounts and greater flexibility without the complexity that sometimes comes with an ELA.  It’s a vehicle that allows end users to buy tokens that are redeemable online for a broad range of VMware product licenses and associated production support and subscription (SnS) during a three-year period and is suited for those looking to make a strategic and long term investment with VMware.  Basically, it’s a program designed to fit a customer who may be too big for a VPP program and too small to sign up for an ELA—the middle guy/gal.

EPP is a token-based program where end users purchase a set of tokens which can be redeemed for most VMware software licensing products.  SnS is automatically added where applicable.  The token to dollar ratio is frozen on a per deal basis and the MSRP is $100 per token.  So we’re talking about a minimum order of 2,500 tokens to get into EPP which is $250,000. The tokens last for 3 years and there is no refund for unused tokens.  End users can distribute their tokens among their projects or departments giving them flexibility to choose their own products whenever they want.

Basically an end user would purchases a bunch of tokens and these tokens go on the MyVMware portal allowing one to redeem these tokens to pick and choose whatever licensing products they need.  The end user doesn’t have to go to their reseller to get a quote and place a licensing order.  With EPP, it’s prepaid and one just redeems the licensing they need off their portal.  Just like a kid at Chuck E. Cheese can run around using his or her tokens to pay for arcade games until he or she runs out or throws up and is forced to go home.  I suppose that since Chuck E. Cheese sells beer, this could also happen to an adult.  Here’s a little caveat though, tokens can’t be used for PSO, renewals or anything else besides software and SnS.  Customers can add tokens to an active contract at any time (minimum of $50K worth for additional tokens).

Features:

An end user would purchase tokens from a VMware partner (like us) as a sku and a quote would be created depending on how many tokens are needed.  There are different skus for different discount levels.  The more tokens one buys, the better discount they get on the token ranging between $250K – $600K.  The end user can then redeem their tokens on their MyVMware portal for VMware licensing products.  The SnS starts when the end user redeems a license and is co-termed to the end of the program term.  EPP grants access to future products ensuring one gets the “latest and greatest.” The license is immediately delivered.  When end users redeem their tokens the license keys are delivered to the MyVMware account.  Once an EPP is started, the end user has 3 years to use their tokens.

So what are the benefits to you, the end user?

For one it’s the Discounts.

EPP offers significant discounts specifically designed for mid-tier enterprise customers. The more tokens purchased the better discounts received on the tokens.

Mix & Matching Anytime. EPP provides the flexibility to mix and match VMware products.  It allows one to purchase any combination of SW licenses within the 3 year term of the EPP.   The flexibility to purchase any time gives you the ability to adapt to fluctuating business and project needs.  If more licenses are required and the tokens have run out, additional tokens can be purchase at the original discounted price.

Easy Management allows the tokens to be redeemed by anyone in the company designated by the customer’s “Fund Owner” (who is an individual in the company who enrolls in EPP and has the authority to purchase, receive and redeem EPP tokens in the MyVMware portal…basically the Nucky Thompson of the company.)  Say the desktop group needs more View licenses. The Fund Owner can set them up to have their own set of tokens to make a purchase. EPP provides access to Future VMware products.

Last, Quick Processing because since EPP is a sku, it can be processed as quickly as VPP and doesn’t require processes required to purchase an ELA.

How EPP Works:  3 Steps

1.)    An end user enrolls in the VPP online enrollment portal at www.vmware.com/go/purchasenow  New customers are required to enroll in either VPP, VPP & EPP, or EPP Only.  EPP Only option is for customers previously enrolled in VPP.  When enrolled, the end user will receive a VPP membership number and approved company name.

2.)    The end user receives a proposed purchase order from their reseller.  The proposal includes the: A.) Estimated amount of tokens that the end user would use over a 3 year term, B) the EPP discount, and C.) EPP Sku.  The end user then communicates the approval of the purchase order to their reseller.

3.)    After the EPP order is processed, tokens will be available on the end user’s MyVMware portal.  End Users can redeem the tokens for SW products receiving the licensing immediately.  When redeeming the tokens the Fund Owner must name a reseller who helped them with the redemption.

The EPP on MyVMware Site:

All the information to redeem tokens after the purchase has been made is on the end user’s MyVMware site.  The site includes an interactive GUI tool that allows the Fund Owner to manage and redeem the tokens.  The Fund Owner(s) will purchase VMware licensing products with their tokens.  The price of the product is on the site and will automatically include the SnS.  The Fund Owner can also create sub funds for different departments to use.  For instance they can create a bucket of funds for the desktop group or the server group and provide access to the site so those users can redeem their bucket of tokens for their own products.  The Fund Owner can transfer tokens between sub funds if a group happens to run out or a group has a surplus they’re not using.   The portal includes charts that detail how many tokens are left and a countdown on how much time is remaining on their EPP.

This is definitely a new and unique way of purchasing VMware.  If you’re interested in learning more about EPP please contact us.

ISO/IEC 27001, New York, StratoGen, Virtualization, VMware

StratoGen Adds New York VMware Hosting, Offers Discount

StratoGen today announced the immediate availability of its latest cloud location in New York, promoting it with an offer of a 33% discount for clients that sign up before the end of November 2012.

“We are really excited to bring our unique VMware hosting solutions to the East Coast.” said Karl Robinson, Vice President of Sales. “Everything we do is driven by the needs of our clients and this expansion is no different.  We built the platform to extremely high standards to ensure our clients’ business critical applications perform exceptionally well and are available 100% of the time. Our no compromise approach meant utilizing top end NetApp SANs and HP Blade systems to give the kind of performance that will leave others reeling.”

StratoGen cloud locations offer an enterprise grade service allowing customers to self-manage their hosted VMware infrastructure through the StratoGen control panel. In addition to deploying elastic servers or VMware appliances; clients can use the control panel to integrate with their local systems (including corporate authentication), build out complex networks, firewalls and even site to site VPNs.

StratoGen also holds SSAE 16 Type II data center certification and ISO 27001 security credentials.


Free, Virtualization, VMware

VMware Hosting Provider StratoGen Offers Free Migration Service

StratoGen today announced the launch of a free migration service aimed at helping larger businesses migrate their on-site VMware footprint into a hosted environment, aiming to both ease and reduce the cost of the transition to the cloud.

“I’m really delighted to be able to announce this service” said Karl Robinson, Vice President of Sales. “For larger organizations moving to the cloud can be a hugely expensive and complex process. Careful assessment and planning is needed to ensure business continuity, along with comprehensive testing to ensure security policies are in place and business applications function correctly. By offering this service free of charge we have taken away one of the last barriers for cloud adoption.”

Engineers in the migration support team at StratoGen hold the highest level qualifications in VMware and Cisco technologies.

Recent surveys have repeatedly shown that business issues rather than technical problems are holding back organizations from migrating to the cloud. The latest report from the Cloud Security Alliance found that data privacy, testing and assurance were top issues.

Organizations planning their migration can also benefit from a consolidation of business applications. According to a recent Cap Gemini report 85% of respondents said their application portfolios were in need of rationalization.

“There is no need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to planning a migration of this type” commented Karl. “We’ve helped countless organizations make the transition to private cloud hosting and enjoy the performance , resilience and agility that StratoGen offers.”

The StratoGen VMware platform is built on Cisco, HP and NetApp components and is available in multiple data centers across the US and Europe.  The company recently announces plans for additional datacenters in New York, USA and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

For further information see StratoGen VMware.


compliance, LogRhythm, Payment card industry, Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, Qualified Security Assessor, Regulatory compliance, VMware, VMware vSphere

LogRhythm Partners with VMware to Automate Regulatory Compliance in Virtualized Environments

LogRhythm today announced that it has partnered with VMware to contribute to its newly introduced VMware Compliance Reference Architectures, a set of resources including solution guides and design architectures intended to simplify compliance for business-critical applications in the cloud era. As part of this initiative, LogRhythm has published the LogRhythm Solution Guide for Payment Card Industry (PCI), an addendum to the VMware Solution Guide for PCI. The LogRhythm solution addendum is a QSA-reviewed guide that outlines how the company’s SIEM 2.0 platform complements existing VMware security capabilities to help customers assure PCI compliance when virtualizing mission-critical business applications with VMware vSphere®.

“Security and compliance are top concerns for organizations seeking to virtualize critical business systems such as PCI payment processing,” said Parag Patel, vice president, Global Strategic Alliances, VMware. “We’re committed to helping customers address these concerns on their journey to the cloud, and partners like LogRhythm extend our native security capabilities to make this possible. Through our solution guides, VMware and LogRhythm are delivering a validated roadmap that details how organizations can achieve PCI compliance in virtualized environments.”

LogRhythm’s SIEM 2.0 platform delivers the visibility and insight needed to detect, defend against and respond to increasingly sophisticated cyber threats, efficiently meet compliance requirements, and proactively respond to operational challenges. The company provides out-of-the box compliance solutions that enable organizations to meet their requirements for log data collection, review, archive, reporting, and alerting under mandates such as PCI, HIPAA, NERC-CIP, GLBA, Sarbanes Oxley, GPG 13, and other regulatory regimes. LogRhythm’s PCI compliance package features specific investigations, alarms and reports designed to meet PCI reporting requirements, and directly addresses or augments at least 80 individual PCI controls. With fully integrated file integrity monitoring, advanced multi-tenant support, robust reporting, and rapid search and drill-down capabilities, LogRhythm is an ideal solution for addressing PCI compliance requirements in virtual environments. LogRhythm can ensure that sensitive data, such as credit card account information, is not inappropriately accessed by shared virtual resources or unauthorized individuals. LogRhythm is field-proven in numerous deployments where the solution is being used to automate and assure regulatory compliance in virtual environments.

“We’re very pleased to have been selected by VMware to help address the compliance requirements of customers moving their critical systems to virtual and private cloud environments,” said Matt Winter, vice president corporate and business development at LogRhythm. “LogRhythm has a significant track record helping customers meet their regulatory compliance obligations in virtual, physical and hybrid environments. Our compliance capabilities dovetail well with VMware’s native security offerings to create a robust and comprehensive solution. With the VMware Solution Guide for PCI and LogRhythm’s addendum solution guide, organizations can have confidence that there is a detailed, validated path to maintaining PCI compliance in virtualized environments.”

The LogRhythm Solution Guide for PCI has been reviewed by Coalfire, an independent Qualified Security Assessor specializing in IT audit, risk assessment and compliance management, and is available for download on the LogRhythm website and VMware Solution Exchange.


Amazon, Candia, Midokura, Networking, Nicira, Start Up, Virtualization, VMware, Wired

NoSQL Pioneer Pino de Candia Taking Aim at Virtual Networking

Wired has a good article today on some of the geniuses and startups in the Virtual Networking space, and how they might “remake the internet.”

Together with Dan Dumitriu — another Amazon vet steeped in the science of massive computing systems — de Candia is one of the key engineers behind a company called Midokura. Much like the oft-discussed Silicon Valley startup Nicira, Midokura deals in virtual networks — computer networks that exist only as software.

Over the past decade, VMware, Microsoft, and others have helped move the world’s computing applications onto virtual servers — machines that exist only as software — and now, a new of wave of companies is fashioning software for building complex virtual networks that tie all those virtual servers together. That’s a hard concept to grasp, but basically, these companies are moving the brains of the network out of hardware and into software.

Read the article.


EMC Corporation, Federal government of the United States, Feds, Government, hybrid cloud, Mission critical, Research, VMware

Study: If Federal Agencies Move Three Applications Each to the Cloud, Savings Top $16 Billion

MeriTalk recently surveyed Federal IT professionals to understand if and how they are moving mission critical applications to the cloud.  They found that Feds estimate they can save $16.6 billion annually if all agencies move just three mission-critical applications to the cloud.

As Federal agencies are making cloud progress, the early-adopters that are moving their mission-critical applications to the cloud are realizing cost savings and improved access to IT, according to the report, which was sponsored by EMC Corporation, VMware and Carahsoft.  The report says the Feds spend more than half their IT budget on supporting mission-critical applications – and that private cloud is the platform of choice for mission-critical application transition.  The study reveals how Federal IT executives view the barriers, current status, and future plans related to this shift.

Not surprisingly, Feds say security is a challenge – 73 percent identify security as a primary barrier.  As a result, most favor private clouds.  Thirty-eight percent of respondents say they have moved a mission-critical application to a private cloud; 11 percent say they have moved a mission-critical application to a hybrid cloud; and, 10 percent say they have moved a mission-critical application to a public cloud.

“Private and hybrid clouds offer significant cost-saving benefits along with the necessary security infrastructure that have not yet been realized through public cloud models,” said Kyle Keller, Cloud Business Director at EMC Federal.  “The benefits of moving mission-critical applications to the cloud can be realized while also maintaining confidence in the security of those resources.”

Agencies spend 70 percent of their IT budget maintaining outdated legacy applications[1] – this is identified as a significant obstacle to cloud transition.  Federal IT executives report that 52 percent of their mission-critical applications are custom built.  When asked what would be required to make mission-critical applications ready for the cloud, 45 percent of Federal IT executives said these applications will require major re-engineering to modernize for the cloud.

Forty six percent of Federal IT executives say moving mission-critical applications to the cloud will improve their agencies ability to fulfill their mission, and 43 percent say it will improve their agencies’ big data analytics capabilities.

Of those who have moved a mission-critical application to the cloud, 91 percent report success.  Federal IT managers surveyed report moving applications including financial management, procurement, logistics, customer relationship management systems, and project management.

“Our customers who are migrating their mission critical applications to the private cloud are realizing great benefits in cost savings, efficiency, availability and agility,” says Aileen Black, Vice President of U.S. Public Sector, VMware.  “These benefits, enabled by the cloud, are the keys to customer success in the cloud.”

“Transitioning legacy, mission-critical applications to the cloud is not a forklift exercise – in many cases it’s more like an organ transplant,” said Steve O’Keeffe, founder, MeriTalk.  “With the complexity and security concerns, it’s not surprising many agencies want a private room.”

“It’s been our experience that agencies are moving to the cloud in great numbers and are, as this survey clearly indicates, achieving significant benefits from doing so,” said Craig P. Abod, President, Carahsoft. “What began with virtualization now encompasses mission-critical applications as the next step in the journey and the value chain.”

Despite the barriers, many Federal IT executives see mission-critical applications in the cloud in their agencies’ futures.  In two years, they expect 26 percent of their mission-critical applications to live in the cloud.  In five years, they expect 44 percent to be in the cloud.  In order to accomplish implementation goals, Federal IT executives recommend promoting cloud savings opportunities, identifying cloud-ready mission-critical applications, clarifying FedRAMP, and encouraging early adopters to share best practices.

“Mission-Critical Cloud:  Ready for the Heavy Lift?” is based on a survey of 151 IT Federal government managers and systems integrators in June 2012.  The report has a margin of error of +/- 7.95 percent at a 95 percent confidence level.

Download the study.


Open Source, OpenStack, OpenStack Foundation, Rackspace, VMware

OpenStack Launches as Independent Foundation

OpenStack  today announced the launch of a new, independent OpenStack Foundation that will continue to promote the development, distribution and adoption of the OpenStack cloud software. As the independent home for OpenStack, the Foundation has already attracted more than 5,600 individual members, secured more than $10 million in funding and is ready to fulfill the OpenStack mission of becoming the ubiquitous cloud computing platform.

The goal of the OpenStack Foundation is to serve developers, users, and the entire ecosystem by providing a set of shared resources to grow the footprint of public and private OpenStack clouds, enable technology vendors targeting the platform and assist developers in producing the best cloud software in the industry.

“The launch of the OpenStack Foundation is not only an important milestone for our community, but a defining moment for the open cloud movement,” said Jonathan Bryce, Executive Director of the OpenStack Foundation. “When you look at what this community has done to innovate and make cloud technologies accessible, as well as make open source synonymous with cloud computing, you understand why huge technology industry leaders and users across the world are placing their bets on OpenStack. The opportunity for OpenStack to become the open source standard for cloud computing is real.”

Like the software, membership within the OpenStack Foundation is free and accessible to anyone. Members are expected to participate in the OpenStack community through technical contributions or community building efforts.

Growth of the OpenStack platform continues on an upward trajectory. Founded in July 2010 by Rackspace and NASA with the support of 25 companies and a few dozen developers, OpenStack has since grown to more than 180 participating companies and 550 contributing developers producing six software releases in a little over two years.

To date, Rackspace has been leading and investing in community management activities, but a year ago the company announced plans to establish an independent Foundation, recognizing the community was thriving and ready for a permanent home. Rackspace has now transitioned management activities and contributed the OpenStack trademark to the new Foundation, creating even greater opportunity for diverse contributors and a vibrant ecosystem necessary for long-term success.

“Since its inception, we knew a foundation was the ultimate goal for OpenStack,” said Lew Moorman, President of Rackspace. “Today, we are proud to finalize the process by donating the assets, handing over community management and giving the OpenStack trademark to the OpenStack Foundation.”

In April 2012, intended Platinum and Gold Member companies formed a Drafting Committee to produce a set of Bylaws and legal documents for community review. In July 2012, 5,000 individuals and eighteen companies ratified the Foundation Bylaws and legal documents by signing up as members. Currently, the Foundation has eight Platinum Members including AT&T, Canonical, HP, IBM, Nebula, Rackspace, Red Hat and SUSE, and thirteen Gold Members including CCAT, Cisco, Cloudscaling, Dell, DreamHost, Mirantis, Morphlabs, NetApp, Piston Cloud Computing, Yahoo!, with Intel, NEC and VMware joining in September. Additional new companies who have begun supporting the Foundation as corporate sponsors include Brocade, eNovance, Gale Technologies, GridCentric, Huawei, Internap, Metacloud, PayPal, RiverMeadow Software, Smartscale Systems, Transcend Computing and Xemeti.

The Individual, Gold and Platinum members each make up a third of the Board of Directors, which provides strategic and financial oversight of Foundation resources and staff. Alan Clark, Director of Industry Initiatives, Emerging Standards and Open Source at SUSE, was elected Chairman of the Board, and Lew Tucker, Vice President and CTO of Cloud Computing at Cisco, was elected Vice Chairman of the Board.

“Our priorities and vision for the Foundation include strengthening the ecosystem, accelerating adoption and empowering the community to deliver the best cloud software out there,” said Alan Clark, Chairman of the Board. “OpenStack’s popularity and industry momentum calls for a solid operational foundation. The new board of directors is feverishly working to ensure that the Foundation is structured with the right executive leadership, staff, fiduciary models and controls all while looking to the priorities and vision for the Foundation. I am honored to serve and support this tremendously innovative community.”

“The OpenStack Foundation represents a new era of establishing open source standards for cloud computing based on multi-vendor collaboration,” said Lew Tucker, Vice Chairman of the Board. “The evolution of OpenStack to an independent foundation is a landmark achievement that reinforces the growing momentum and industry support that has galvanized around this organization and its mission.”

Separate of the Board, the fully elected OpenStack Technical Committee – an evolution of the Project Policy Board – will steward the technical direction of OpenStack software development and includes elected Project Technical Leads from each of the core software projects. Tim Bell, Operating Systems and Infrastructure Services Group Leader at CERN, was appointed by the Board of Directors to help establish a new User Committee, created to represent a broad set of enterprise, academic and service provider users with the Technical Committee and Board of Directors.

Led by Executive Director, Jonathan Bryce, the Foundation is hiring 10-12 employees who, under the strategic direction of the Board, will help carry out the OpenStack mission. Specific responsibilities include coordinating the project’s infrastructure, such as systems for testing the software at scale, community building activities, and managing the OpenStack trademark, which was transferred from Rackspace following the first board meeting.

Meet the new community leaders and learn more about the Foundation at the next OpenStack Summit, October 15 – 18, in San Diego, CA.


Featured, Miscellaneous IT, VMware, vSphere

Important! VMware’s Kickoff News and Promotions

By Rob O’Shaughnessy

Opening week for the NFL, apple cider donuts and VMware product announcements are all signs that autumn is finally here. I’m not sure what I’m more excited about, no more vRAM entitlement conversations or the Patriots new look offense. Being a big sports nut and self-titled President all things Boston Sports in greater Los Angeles I should say the Patriots, but not having to explain vRAM and this many gigabytes is what you get with that edition and 12-month average and high water marks, etc. etc. etc. is going to be nice.

VMware announced version 5.0 on August 22nd last year so I spent a whole year’s worth of breaths talking about vRAM. I want those breaths back VMware!!! I could have used that time to eat apple cider donuts. I digress. So some of you may have heard the announcements, or got a sprinkling of the announcements, or may not even know what I’m talking about, but that’s okay, because what I’ve put together is a little short list of important stuff to know in the world of VMware.

vSphere:
First and foremost vSphere 5.1 was released and this update will just be licensed by the socket. VMware is no longer requiring vRAM entitlement, so the days of thinking about the numbers 32, 64 and 96 are now gone. In addition, the other good news is that vSphere 5.1’s pricing did not change. There is also a new edition to the vSphere family. VMware has added vSphere Standard with Operations Management, so now there are four editions of vSphere to choose from:

vSphere Standard
-vSphere Standard with Operations Management
-vSphere Enterprise
-vSphere Enterprise Plus

It addition to adding vSphere Standard with Operations Management to the product line-up, VMware has also included it into their Acceleration Kit portfolio, so along with the Standard, Enterprise and Enterprise Plus Acceleration Kits, there will also be a vSphere Standard with Operations Management Acceleration Kit. These four kit options will include 6 processor licenses of the vSphere edition of your choice and vCenter Standard Server. One change to note is that the vSphere Standard Acceleration Kit used to include 8 processors, but it now just includes six. Last, all the Accelerations Kits and the Essentials Plus kit will now include the vSphere Storage Appliance at no additional charge. Sweet!

Desktop Products:
Desktop Products such as View, Workstation and Fusion have had a price increase of 10%. Also announced is VMware View’s new management product vCenter Operations Manager for View. This product is available as an add-on component for VMware View Enterprise and Premier. Using the same concurrent user license model as VMware View, packages are available in increments of 10 and 100 concurrent users.

vCloud Suites:
VMware also made the announcement of their new vCloud Suites, which combine VMware’s top products into one bundle. VMware is offering 3 editions:
vCloud Suite Standard – $4,999: vSphere Enterprise Plus, vCloud Director & vCloud Connector, vCloud Networking and Security Standard
vCloud Suite Advanced – $7,495: vSphere Enterprise Plus, vCloud Director & vCloud Connector, vCloud Networking and Security Advanced, vCOps Advanced
vCloud Suite Enterprise – $11,495: vSphere Enterprise Plus, vCloud Director & vCloud Connector, vCloud Networking and Security Advanced, vCOps Enterprise, vCenter Chargeback Manager, Configuration Manager, Infrastructure Navigation, vFabric Application Director and SRM

So an interesting thing to point out: Looking at the Standard Edition of vCloud Suite you’ll see that it retails for $4,999 and includes a bunch of stuff like: vSphere Enterprise Plus, VMware vCloud Director, VMware vCloud Connector, VMware vCloud Networking and Security Standard. On the other hand vSphere Enterprise Plus alone retails for $3,495 so for another $1,504 the vCloud Suite Standard Ed will get you vSphere Enterprise Plus and all that other stuff. It’s sort of VMware’s version of Super-Size Me.

Promotions:
VMware is offering some nice promotions to this as well and here are a couple of popular ones to note. For a full list of all VMware’s promotions there is a nifty app you can download on your phone: http://www.vmware.com/go/promoapp

vCloud Promo:
Upgrade from vSphere Enterprise Plus to vCloud Suite Standard for free!
Or, Upgrade from vSphere Enterprise or Enterprise Plus to vCloud Suite Advanced or Enterprise for around 35% (it’s 32-38% depending on the edition you currently own).
Available until December 15, 2012.

**Customers can qualify for this promotion in one of two ways. Customers must:
1. Have an active Support and Subscription (SnS) agreement to vSphere Enterprise or vSphere Enterprise Plus made prior to August 27, 2012 and at time of upgrade, and must complete their upgrade transaction with VMware before the expiration of the promotion.
2. Or, reinstate SnS to vSphere Enterprise or vSphere Enterprise Plus before December 10, 2012, have active SnS at time of upgrade, and complete their upgrade transaction with VMware by December 15, 2012 mbennett@unum.com mbennett@unum.com
**New purchases of vSphere Enterprise or vSphere Enterprise Plus made on or after August 27, 2012 are not eligible for this promotion.

vSphere Std w/ Ops Promo:
Upgrade to VMware vSphere Standard with Operations Management and save 30%
Available until December 15, 2012

View 5 Premier Bundle Promo:
Get 25% off View 500 pack or 18% off View 250 pack
Available until December 15, 2012

VC Ops for View Promo:
25% discount on vCenter Operations Manager for View 10 and 100 packs
Available until December 15, 2012

Horizon App Manager Bundle Promo:
50% off Horizon Application Manager with purchase of View Premier
Available until December 15, 2012
Purchase a minimum of 100 pack of View Premier and get 50% off the license list price for Horizon Application Manager.

Backup, Disaster Recovery, Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity, VMware

EVault 7: The New Shape of Backup and Recovery

EVault, Inc. today announced the release of EVault 7, a significant update to its cloud-connected backup and recovery platform. The new release offers a more resilient architecture, with enhanced replication and additional deployment options that customers can tailor to their needs. EVault 7 delivers faster backups – up to 100 percent faster for VMware environments than EVault 6 – and is optimized for a distributed environment. As part of this release, EVault is introducing a new management interface built around the ”social business.”

“With EVault 7, our customers are seeing the future shape of data protection,” said Terry Cunningham, president and general manager, EVault. “Our backup and recovery platform is designed for a cloud-connected world – and now it’s faster, smarter and more resilient than ever. We’ve also added a management interface built on a social platform, so customers can stay on top of their data protection operations and collaborate in real-time with colleagues, peers and the EVault team.”

Unlike  solutions that force customers into a rigid deployment model for backup and recovery, EVault 7 now offers geographically-distributed replicas in a private cloud, a service provider cloud, the EVault cloud – or in all three. Should an IT organization want an onsite cache of their data for fast, local recoveries, they can deploy EVault Express Recovery Appliance: Virtual Edition and get LAN-speed backup and recovery. Because the virtual appliance fits within current environments, it lowers total cost of ownership by leveraging existing IT infrastructure and eliminating the need for additional capital expenses.

Smarter, faster and more efficient than ever, EVault 7 helps IT managers put an end to worries about backup and recovery windows. Updated support for VMware environments includes fast granular restores of files and folders from only a single backup of the virtual machine, delivering backups 100 percent faster than EVault 6. With WAN-optimized data transfer that now has faster replication, EVault 7 customers achieve efficient bandwidth usage, storage optimization and end-to-end security. Granular recovery will also be available for mailbox and message-level restores within Microsoft Exchange applications by the end of the year.

“With EVault, we know that we can deploy cloud-based backup and recovery without having to sacrifice security, speed and efficiency,” said Bill McCown, Director of Information Technology at C&J Energy Services, Inc. “EVault 7 also gives us the system and application support we need, at the level we need it. I can protect and recover my data within time windows that don’t disrupt our business.”


Featured, Miscellaneous IT, Virtualization, VMware, VMworld

VMworld Recap: Day One

Day 1 at VMworld 2012 has been pretty action packed.  The first order of business was the official handing over of the reins from Paul Maritz to Pat Gelsinger as CEO of VMware.  Paul will remain involved as he is taking the Chief Strategist role at EMC which owns 80% of VMware so I would not expect his influence to go away anytime soon.  From conversations I’ve had with others both inside and outside of VMware, the primary reason for this move seems to be purely operational.  Paul is an absolute visionary and has taken VMware to some fantastic heights over his four-year tenure, however there have been some challenges on the operational side in executing on the great visions.  This is where Pat comes into the picture as he’s historically been a pure operations guy so I envision the team of Paul and Pat to do some great things for VMware going forward.

Some other key highlights from the Keynote are as follows:

  1. It is estimated that 60% of all x86 server workloads in the world are now virtualized and 80% of that 60% are virtualized on ESX/vSphere.
  2. There are now 125,000 VCP certified engineers worldwide, almost a 5-fold increase from 4 years ago
  3. The dreaded vRAM allocation licensing model for vSphere 5 is now officially dead with the release of vSphere 5.1.  VMware is going back to per socket licensing and neither RAM nor cores matter.  Personally, I am not sure this was a great move as I think most people were over the headache of vRAM and in reality I never saw a single customer who was adversely affected by it.  When Pat announced this, I think he thought the entire auditorium would roar in appreciation but that was not the case.  Yes, there was some cheering, but even Pat made mention of the fact that it wasn’t the full on reaction he expected.
  4. There are a lot of new certifications and certification tracks that were announced to better align with VMware’s definition of the new “stack.”  These tracks include the pre-existing datacenter infrastructure certs plus new ones around Cloud (think vCloud Director here), Desktop (View and Wanova/Mirage), and Apps (SpringSource).  I’ll be taking the new VCP-IaaS exam tomorrow so wish me luck!
  5. There was a light touch on both the Dynamic Ops and Nicira acquisitions.  Both of these have huge implications for VMware but really not much was announced at the show.  Both of these are very recent acquisitions so it will take some time for VMware to get them integrated but I am very excited about the possibilities of each.
  6. There was an announcement of the vCloud Suite, which essentially is a bundling of existing VMware products under a singular license model.  There are the typical Standard, Enterprise, and Enterprise Plus editions of the suite which include different pieces and parts, but the Enterprise Plus edition throws in about everything and the kitchen sink including….
    1. vSphere 5.1 Enterprise Plus
    2. vCenter Operations Enterprise
    3. vCloud Director
    4. vCloud networking/security (I assume this will eventually include Nicira networking virtualization and the vShield product family)
    5. Site Recovery Manager
    6. vFabric Application Director
    7. Lots of focus on virtualization of business critical applications and not just the usual suspects of SQL, Oracle, Exchange, etc.  There was a cool demo of Hadoop via Project Serengeti which automates the spinning up/down of various Hadoop VMs and this is delivered as a single virtual appliance.  GreenPages has done a lot in the business critical app virtualization space over the past couple of years and we remain excited about the possibilities that virtualization brings to these beefy apps.
    8. One of the big geeky announcements is around the concept of shared nothing vMotion.  This means that you can now move a live running VM between two host servers but without any requirement for shared storage, basically vMotion without a SAN.  This has massive implications in the SMB and branch office spaces where the cost of shared storage was very prohibitive.  Now you can get some of the cool benefits of virtualization using only very cheap direct attached storage!
    9. The final piece of the keynote showed VMware’s vision for virtualization of “everything” including compute, storage, and networking.  Look for some very cool stuff coming over the next 6 months or so in relation to new ways of thinking about networking and storage within a virtual environment.  These are two elements that really have not fundamentally changed how they work since the advent of x86 virtualization and we are now running into limitations due to this.  VMware is leading the charge in changing the way we think about these two critical elements and looking at very interesting ways to attack design and in the end making it much simpler to work with networking and storage technologies within virtualized environments.

Have to jump back over for Day 2 activities now, but be on the lookout for some upcoming GreenPages events where we’ll dive deeper into the announcements from the show!