It’s now less than a month until the UK Cloud Summit takes place in London so if you haven’t already registered for the event, now is the time to sign up.

This two-day event is a must-attend for those looking to find out how to start driving or continue to drive business success using cloud and related technologies. 

“Discover new, disruptive technologies fuelled by the cloud (Infinite Possibilities), explore ways that they can benefit from category leading cloud solutions (Infinite Ecosystems), and grasp the challenges of transforming their business in the digital economy (Infinite Growth),” said Scott Murphy, director of cloud and advanced solutions and Ingram Micro in the UK and Ireland.

“You’ll learn about the extraordinary shift that’s taking the channel in a bold, new direction. Where the unknown becomes known. Where your business can leap forward in cloud enablement, and where the infinite potential becomes infinite reality.”

So, if you’re still thinking about attending the summit – which takes place on 21 and 22 May at the Landmark Hotel in London – here are some compelling reasons to attend:

1)Hot topics discussed and debated

There’s even more to talk about now the summit is in its third year. That’s why we’re pleased to have the event running across two days rather than one.  By expanding the duration, it means we can do even more topics justice.

Indeed, there are 18 sessions across the two days, with three learning tracks – Infinite Possibilities, Infinite Ecosystem and Infinite Growth – so that we really can quench your thirst for knowledge.

There will be plenty of talk, as well as answers to questions around cloud generally, AI, analytics, BI, blockchain, cyber security, IaaS, IoT, SaaS, XaaS and more.

2)Feast on more than just information

While we know the main reason you would want to attend the summit is to feed your hunger for knowledge, we also know how important it is to relax in between the two days.

It’s also important we take time to reflect as individuals and as an industry collective on our achievements and successes.

That’s why, this year, we will be hosting a luxury gala dinner in the spectacular Grand Ballroom. In addition to a delicious dinner in a fantastic setting, we will also host our first partner awards and recognition ceremony.

3)Myths debunked

The world of technology innovation moves at a rapid pace and it can be very easy to get swept along in the sea of hype. But jumping on the next big thing for the sake of it rather than with a reasoned business case can be a very dangerous thing indeed for businesses.

That’s why, in addition to talking about myriad of benefits on offer, we will also be talking honestly about the challenges and how you can best overcome them or navigate your way away from them altogether.

4)Networking opportunities galore

More than 350 like-minded individuals will be attending the event. That’s a fantastic opportunity to network, exchange ideas and opinions and bounce ideas off of one another.

It’s very often the connections made through networking opportunities like this that really give you the insight and additional support you need to drive your business into its next phase of success.

5)World-class speakers

This year’s event is hosted by Alex Hilton, CEO of the Cloud Industry Forum (CIF). He’ll be joined by some really engaging keynote speakers who will all give their perspective on the world of cloud. That’s in addition to some really enticing breakout sessions that offer deeper dives on certain subjects.

Nimesh Davé, executive vice president of global cloud at Ingram Micro will be joined by other industry luminaries such as:

• Alexis Conran, TV presenter and former conman, best known for presenting The Real Hustle
• James Chadwick, director of channel sales at Microsoft
• Ronan McCurtin, vice president of northern Europe at Acronis
• Richard Agnew, vice president of EMEA at Code42
• Tim Britt, head of UK channel at Dropbox Business
• Scott Murphy, director of cloud and advanced solutions at Ingram Micro
• Leigh Schvartz, head of cloud and MSP offerings at Fujitsu

Google has said it will offer its users an option to automatically delete their search and location history after three months.

The company already allows users to manually delete data from products such as YouTube, Maps and Search, but it will soon provide a tool that automatically deletes it after a minimum of three months.

Users will be able to increase the time range to 18 months and any data older than that will be automatically deleted from their accounts on an ongoing basis. These controls will be for location history and web and app activity and will be available «in the coming weeks» according to Google.

«We work to keep your data private and secure and we’ve heard your feedback that we need to provide simpler ways for you to manage or delete it,» Google said on its blog.

These new data management tools comes a day after both Microsoft and Facebook announced features for users to have greater control over their personal data. It highlights a growing trend of companies that offer digital services making an effort to show responsibility with data privacy.

But, as many will point out, these same companies have come under greater scrutiny recently for the way they collect and use personal data. From data breaches to violations of their own data privacy policies, each company has a large rap sheet when it comes to vague terms and conditions or the collection of data without user knowledge.

In August, Google claimed that Chrome’s incognito feature allowed users to browse privately, but a study from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, found that the company could still monitor and record the sites a user visited.

When it comes to controversial data policies, however, Google isn’t the worst offender. After the Cambridge Analytica scandal revealed the extent of Facebook’s improper data sharing policy, the company has gone from one data related issue to the next.

Currently, the social network is under investigation from the Irish Data Protection Commission, the US FTC and has already been fined £500,000 by the ICO – which it has appealed.

VMware has expanded its presence in the public cloud, with the news that Microsoft will be introducing native support for VMware workloads to Azure.

The announcement was made at Dell Technologies World in Las Vegas by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who took to the main stage alongside VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger and Dell Technologies CEO and founder Michael Dell.

«In my close to 30 years of working in technology, I’ve never seen a trend like digital transformation,» Nadella told attendees. «It’s just phenomenal to see that and what is fueling that, or what is needed in order to fuel that is great infrastructure; the flexibility with which people can get at the infrastructure, the compute that is needed, the storage that’s needed, the networking capabilities that are needed in order to drive that business forward.

«And so I’m really thrilled and pleased to announce the availability of Azure VMware solutions, which brings all of the VMware capabilities natively to Azure and to Azure customers so that every customer has that infrastructure: the best of VMware, as well as the best of Azure.»

Azure VMware Solutions will allow customers to run VMware workloads in native environments, utilising VMware tools like vSphere, vSAN, vCenter and NSX. These workloads can be ported directly over to Azure with no refactoring necessary, enabling organisations to cut down on migration and deployment time.

Built using VMware Cloud Foundation, the Azure VMware Solutions have been developed in partnership with CloudSimple and Dell subsidiary Virtustream, but will be sold by Microsoft as a first-party product.

The announcement marks a turning point in the so-called ‘hypervisor wars’ between VMware and Microsoft’s competing virtualisation product, Hyper-V, indicating that Microsoft may have abandoned its ambition to make Hyper-V a sizeable player in the industry.

«It’s interesting because I’m sure Microsoft would have liked the world to be Hyper-V,» said Phil Mogavero, the vice president of HDC partnerships for channel vendor PCM. «Some of it will be Hyper V but I think for VMware really to be truly legitimate, it has to be on Azure. And I think for Microsoft to truly be legitimate it’s got to have VMware vSphere capability within Azure. So I think it’s a good move.»

It also means that Google Cloud Platform is now the only one of the major public cloud providers that does not support VMware, following the introduction of VMware on Azure a number of years ago.

In addition to Azure VMware Solutions, the three companies also announced further integrations across various products. For example, VMware’s Workspace One platform will now integrate with Microsoft Intune and Azure Active Directory, allowing customers to manage their Microsoft 356 and Office 365 deployments with Workspace One. Similarly, Microsoft’s recently-announced Windows Virtual Desktop platform will also be supported by VMware Horizon Cloud on Microsoft Azure, with early previews expected by the end of the year. VMware and Microsoft are also reportedly working on more general integrations, such as between Azure Networking and VMware NSX.

VMware has formally announced its data centre-as-a-service offering, allowing customers to deploy on-premise infrastructure on a subscription basis, completely managed by VMware.

Previously teased at VMworld last year under the codename ‘Project Dimension’, the service was unveiled at Dell Technologies World in Las Vegas, and is officially known as VMware Cloud on Dell EMC. The offering will consist of pre-packaged bundles consisting of VMware’s vShere, vSAN and NSX management products, running on three or more of Dell EMC’s VxRail hyperconverged infrastructure nodes, along with two switches and SD-WAN appliances, as well as an uninterruptible power supply.

The product offers cloud-like deployment models, not just in terms of pricing, but also with regard to deployment and management. Customers can order new infrastructure capacity via an API call or via the VMware Cloud management console, and Dell EMC will construct, deliver, install and configure it. Not only that, but VMware will fully manage the infrastructure from that point on, monitoring for performance issues, applying patches and upgrades on the customer’s behalf and automatically deploying a Dell EMC engineer in the event of hardware problems.

Customers will pay a single monthly price based on the number of hosts per rack, with no added charges for support or services. Software and hardware fees are also included in the cost.

«You have the agility with the hands-off simplicity of the public cloud, while retaining that predictable and controlled environment of your own data center, delivered as a fully managed solution by Dell Technologies,» VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger explained in a keynote speech. «Also, we are responsible for doing software patching, upgrading and lifecycle management. We take care of that, as well as the hardware service upgrade and firmware management, as well. And it’s fully bought as a purchase subscription, just like you would a cloud service. It’s just your on premise hardware, your environment, in your datacenter or branch.»

VMware Cloud on Dell EMC falls under the umbrella of the newly-launched Dell Technologies Cloud brand, a subset of the company’s portfolio that aims to use VMware as a consistent management and infrastructure layer for hybrid and multi-cloud deployments. VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail – which was announced at VMworld last year and started shipping last month – also comes under this banner. This, by contrast, uses a more traditional VMware deployment model, and is managed by the customer.

«In going for the future there will be additional routes,» said Tom O’Reilly, Dell EMC’s EMEA field CTO for cloud, converged and hyperconverged infrastructure, «so we’ll have not just VxRail but we’ll have converged infrastructure that can be delivered on premise, we’ll have bundles and ready solutions that can deliver it, if you don’t want to go with a converged or hyperconverged experience. So we’ll have multiple routes to deliver Dell Technologies Cloud, but the experience, the software layer, the operational and management experience, will be consistent across all these.»

Dell has been a major proponent of the multi-cloud model, so unsurprisingly, VMware Cloud on Dell EMC also allows customers to manage their VMware workloads in the public cloud, migrating them between public and private as necessary. This will also includes Azure workloads, following the announcement that Microsoft was introducing native support for the full range of VMware capabilities on Azure.

This new service dovetails with Dell’s new Unified Workspace service, which offers a comprehensive endpoint management suite for customers, spanning the initial ordering and configuration process all the way up to patching and ongoing support.

VMware Cloud on Dell EMC is currently available in beta, with full US availability scheduled for the second half of this year. While no timeline has been given for European availability, O’Reilly told Cloud Pro that the region will be next in line after North America.

«The way Dell EMC divides the world is into different tiers of countries,» he said, «and Northern Europe is tier one. So, this will be the first to get it outside of the US.»

Dell is aiming to take the hassle out of configuring and deploying laptops, with the launch of a new endpoint management platform that brings together a number of the company’s technologies and services.

The platform, dubbed the Dell Technologies Unified Workspace, is designed to give IT departments a simple and automated platform for managing devices.

Based on VMware’s Workspace One product, the Unified Workspace allows IT departments to order devices which are imaged, configured and provisioned with all of the customer’s business applications before they leave the factory, including the ability to personalise which applications are installed on a per-user basis. When customers receive their devices, Dell said, end users will be able to start working in minutes, as opposed to hours.

The platform also supports endpoint management tasks over the entire lifecycle of corporate devices, including automated patch deployment, device health and status information, and cloud-based policy tools. In line with Dell’s emphasis on the importance of data analysis, the Unified Workspace will collect and collate data from customers’ device fleets, which will allow IT departments to analyse usage patterns and identify their most widely-used apps.

To ensure security, the Unified Workspace platform integrates with tools from SecureWorks and CrowdStrike, including off-host BIOS storage and verification, threat intelligence data, behavioural analytics and more. In addition, the platform includes integrated support capabilities to allow IT to shorten the time it takes to resolve helpdesk tickets.

Customers can also spread the cost over monthly instalments via Dell Financial Services’ PC-as-a-Service offering, which offers a cloud-style consumption-based payment model for physical devices.

«No setup, no imaging, no provisioning, no installation,» said Dell vice chairman of products and operations Jeff Clarke. «No configuration is, we like to say, no problem.»

These capabilities aren’t new, however; the company already offers all of them, in the form of services like the Dell ProDeploy Client Suite and ProSupport.

Rather, the Dell Technologies Unified Workspace combines all of these functions into a single, unified console.

The value for customers comes from the simplicity and time savings that this centralisation can bring, along with the benefits of rolling all of the various costs into one monthly fee.

Alongside this new service, Dell also unveiled a brand new Data Centre-as-a-Service offering, VMware Cloud on Dell EMC. Coming as part of the newly-launched Dell Technologies Cloud portfolio, the offering is a fully managed VMware cloud solution, controlled through VMware’s cloud management console and deployed on Dell EMC hardware within the customer’s own data centre.

The aim is to allow customers to seamlessly move their workloads between public cloud, on-premise infrastructure and edge installations, with VMware acting as a central, consistent infrastructure layer.

Dell EMC is planning on tripling the amount of AMD-based servers in its portfolio, following the success of the chip manufacturer’s EPYC range.

AMD spent a long time in the wilderness, playing second fiddle to main rival Intel across both the desktop and server markets. Its Zen microarchitecture, however, has been met with widespread acclaim, with Zen-based chips offering a noticeably lower TCO than equivalent Intel parts. In our tests, EPYC-based servers from Dell EMC, Broadberry and HPE all showcased phenomenal per-core performance for an excellent price.

This has not gone unnoticed by Dell. The company currently offers three server platforms that use AMD chips but Dominique Vanhamme, the company’s EMEA vice president and general manager for storage and compute told IT Pro that the company is planning to triple the number of AMD-based platforms it offers by the end of the year.

«Out of, let’s say, 50 or so platforms that we have today,» he said, «three of them are AMD – we’ll probably triple that by the end of this year.»

He also confirmed that Dell EMC will be launching servers powered by AMD’s newest architecture – a 7nm architecture codenamed ‘Rome’ – in the second half of 2019.

While AMD will still be a minority among Dell’s server platforms, this planned expansion is in contrast to comments made by Dell EMC CTO John Roese last year, who told Cloud  Pro that Intel was still «the big player» in the market and that the company had no plans to substantially increase its AMD offering, stating «don’t expect it to be a duopoly any time soon».

A significant barrier to AMD’s growth in the server market, as Vanhamme pointed out, is that any workloads that currently run on Intel servers will need to be re-validated to run on AMD-powered hardware. Given Intel’s relative stranglehold on the market, this means that a full AMD migration is likely to be a major project for any sizeable company.

One of the primary driving factors behind this expansion of AMD platforms is a growing demand from customers, according to Vanhamme. The lower TCO offered by AMD’s EPYC chips is a large factor, he says; along with a cheaper list price, many EPYC chips use fewer cores and sockets to match the performance of equivalent Intel systems, which means that CIOs can save money on per-core and per-socket licensing costs. Lower power consumption is also attractive, he said.

One thing that surprised Vanhamme was the demand for EPYC servers from general-purpose customers. For example. high-performance computing was expected to be the biggest revenue driver, due to the per-core and per-socket performance advantages, but general demand has been surprisingly strong.

«So in the original plan, we were thinking that it will be a few first verticals that will pick up, like service providers,» he said. «We thought that maybe there are some hosters that may want to have that extra capacity when they provide IaaS services. We clearly see HPC, but we also see general customers for sure.»

CompTIA has unveiled an overhaul of its Cloud Essentials+ beta exam, ensuring those undertaking the qualification have up to date skills to sell the cloud into their businesses.

The exam has between 80% and 90% new content for students to pass, addressing scenarios and skills needed to help businesses make decisions about cloud products and services.

“The cloud has sparked an evolution in thinking about the role of technology; from a behind-the-scenes tactical tool to a valuable strategic asset that turns businesses into digital organisations and makes greater innovation possible,” said Dr James Stanger, chief technology evangelist at CompTIA.

The CompTIA Cloud Essentials+ beta exam includes content such as how to conduct a comprehensive cloud assessment, the business, financial and operational implications of moving to the cloud and security, risk management and compliance threats and solutions.

It also includes a section on new technologies business may want to integrate into their cloud strategies such as data analytics, the Internet of Things and blockchain.

“To unlock its true value, decision-makers must have a clear understanding about cloud technologies and their potential business impacts,” Stanger continued.

“Individuals who are CompTIA Cloud Essentials+ certified have demonstrated that they have the knowledge and skills to make informed decisions and recommendations on the business case for the cloud.”

As a completely vendor-neutral qualification, CompTIA said its certification varies greatly to its competitors.

Candidates wishing to undertake the exam should have between six and 12 months experience working as an analyst in an IT environment, with some cloud exposure.