Today cloud computing facilitated by virtualization continues emerging as the service delivery vehicle for IT to shorten go-to-market while facing unpredictable data patterns and workloads. The increasing complexities and growing user expectations make system management on the center stage of a cloud computing solution. In addition to automation, we now need a self-service model to fundamentally reduce the cost structure of training and maintenance. Besides processes and procedures, we now need work-flows and orchestration. The requirements for a management solution are now the abilities to identify and manage resources deployed to hetrogeneous virtualization platforms in a hybrid scenario of cloud computing with predictability and repeatability. A single and unified platform with a consistent user experience to manage all IT resources including physical, virtualized, private cloud, and public cloud resources becomes critical for increasing efficiency and reducing TCO at the same time. From a deployment point of view, the abilities to deploy: OS to bare metal, virtual machines to virtualization host groups, and services to a private cloud signify the arrival of deployment as a service. And VMM 2012 implements and proves this concept.

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