Here is something that will certainly cause reverberation in the market. Some of you may have already heard of “Alpine,” the codename for Acadia. VMware, Cisco, and EMC just announced that they are joining forces and making significant investments to enable data centers to accelerate the value of virtualization by delivering products (Vblocks), services, and support as a unified team. Cisco and EMC will form a joint venture named Acadia with the goal of helping to accelerate the adoption of virtualization and the transparent transition from physical to virtual and ultimately to cloud computing. Acadia will build, operate, and transfer an integrated end-to-end solution with pre-integrated solutions from the coalition. Acadia does not plan to deliver standalone Vblocks and will leave this up to the channel and partner ecosystem.(Podcast: Cisco-EMC venture makes cloud accessible to customers)
Quick Note: Vblocks are Cisco UCS, EMC storage and VMware vSphere integrated as a single modular unit. They will come in small (Vblock 0), medium (Vblock 1) and large (Vblock 2).
Acadia National Park just happens to be one of my favorite places to visit in Maine. Mainers like to say “Ya can’t get there from here.”
Can Acadia?
I’ll pull together some research and a VCE (VMware, Cisco, EMC) company brief and will post a follow up blog shortly with more details.
Here are some details and a linkto the announcement:
ANNOUNCEMENT DETAILS:
1. First Offering: Vblock Infrastructure Packages
The Virtual Computing Environment coalition today introduced Vblock Infrastructure Packages to accelerate the virtualization of IT infrastructures by minimizing risk, complexity and time to benefit.
Vblock Infrastructure Packages are validated platforms of engineered, integrated IT infrastructure from Cisco, EMC and VMware, that deliver a breakthrough total cost of ownership and pervasive virtualization at a scale to meet today's most demanding use cases.
Vblock Infrastructure Packages can be easily scaled with additional compute and storage capability after purchase, a key differentiator versus today's monolithic IT systems.
Vblock Infrastructure Packages can be extended by complementary systems integrators, service providers, channel partners, and ISVs.
Early customer trials of Vblock Infrastructure Packages have delivered up to 40 percent reductions in the cost of operating and managing virtualized data center infrastructures.
The following family of Vblock Infrastructure Packages is being offered by the Virtual Computing Environment coalition:
Vblock 2 is a high-end configuration supporting up to 3,000-6,000 virtual machines that is completely extensible to meet the most demanding IT needs of large enterprises and service providers. Designed for large-scale and 'green field' virtualization, Vblock 2 takes advantage of Cisco's Unified Computing System (UCS), Nexus 1000v and Multilayer Directional Switches (MDS), EMC's Symmetrix V-Max storage (secured by RSA), and the VMware vSphere platform.
Vblock 1 is a mid-sized configuration supporting 800 up to 3,000 virtual machines to deliver a broad range of IT capabilities to organizations of all sizes. Designed for consolidation and optimization initiatives, Vblock 1 is comprised of a repeatable model leveraging Cisco's UCS, Nexus 1000v and MDS, EMC's CLARiiON storage (secured by RSA), and the VMware vSphere platform.
Vblock 0 will be an entry-level configuration available in 2010, supporting 300 up to 800 virtual machines, for the first time bringing the benefits of private clouds within reach of medium-sized businesses, small data centers or organizations, and for test and development by channel partners, systems integrators, service providers, ISVs, and customers. Vblock 0 is also comprised of a repeatable model leveraging Cisco's UCS and Nexus 1000v, EMC's Unified Storage (secured by RSA), and the VMware vSphere platform.
Also today, EMC is introducing IonixTM Unified Infrastructure Manager as an integrated, unified element manager for Vblock. Unified management is a central factor in helping customers reduce operating expenses. As an element manager, Ionix Unified Infrastructure Manager is designed to support a wide range of enterprise management consoles.
A comprehensive security framework based on EMC RSA security products, including RSA enVision, has been validated with Vblock Infrastructure Packages. RSA security solutions are layered onto the Vblock architecture to deliver security policy management and security at three levels: identity, information and infrastructure. Vblock is designed to extend a customer's existing enterprise security controls to the virtual infrastructure and does not require the customer to replace security software already in place.
Further Vblock Infrastructure Packages will be developed to serve business needs across three categories: shared services, applications and vertical industry solutions. For example, the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure on Vblock solutions will enhance the provisioning, scale-out and back-end management of enterprise applications and users. To help ensure solutions are de-risked and highly secure, Vblocks will be ISO 27001 compliant.
Vblock Infrastructure Packages are scheduled to be available this quarter direct from authorized systems integrators and channel partners. EMC, Cisco and VMware components can be purchased directly from the respective companies or their authorized partners.
2. Integrated Presales, Professional Services and Support
The Virtual Computing Environment coalition has committed to unify customer engagement with investments spanning dedicated pre-sales, professional services and single support experience to provide a seamless, end-to-end customer and partner experience.
The Virtual Computing Environment coalition Solution Support Team is a cross-company presales team, fully trained in all elements of Vblock architecture and go-to-market resources to work with customers and partners and to facilitate engagements.
Virtual Computing Environment coalition professional services, jointly developed and delivered, will help customers to understand how to maximize value and speed time to solution. These offers include: the Cloud-based Business Advisory Service, Private Cloud Strategic Impact Advisory Service, Private Cloud Architecture Impact Advisory Service, Virtual Desktop Advisory Service, Cloud Computing Strategy Service, and Vblock Design and Implementation Service.
Virtual Computing Environment seamless support offers customers unmatched technical support and rapid problem resolution for virtualization and private cloud solutions. The coalition companies will leverage in-depth cross training and investments in joint problem re-creation labs as well as integrated processes and best practices with a single point of accountability.
3. Acadia Solutions Joint Venture and Investment
The Virtual Computing Environment coalition today also introduced Acadia — a Cisco and EMC solutions joint venture to build, operate, and transfer Vblock infrastructure to organizations that want to accelerate their journey to pervasive virtualization and private cloud computing while reducing their operating expenses. Acadia expects to begin customer operations in the first calendar quarter of calendar year 2010.
Founded on a Vblock architecture that incorporates Cisco, EMC and VMware technologies, Acadia will train and help customers and an ecosystem of service providers and other partners to build, operate and transfer Vblock Infrastructure Packages to customers or their partner of choice.
In addition to Cisco and EMC as the majority investors, the build-out of Acadia's global capabilities in 2010 also has been capitalized by investments from VMware and Intel.
"We have been pleased to contribute industry leading data center building blocks to server and storage solutions from EMC and Cisco. We look forward to extending these relationships by supporting their Virtual Computing Environment coalition in a similar fashion," said Kirk Skaugen, vice president and General Manager of Intel's Data Center Group. "Our investment in Acadia will provide a deployment option for customers looking to take advantage of Intel's latest data center innovations."
4. Vblock Partner Ecosystem
The Virtual Computing Environment coalition has established a robust set of partners committed to the coalition. This includes representation from the entire partner ecosystem, including systems integrators, value added resellers, service providers, and independent software vendors. There are six system integrators at launch: Accenture, Capgemini, CSC, Lockheed Martin, Tata Consulting Services, and Wipro.
The entire community of partners will augment, sell and deliver Vblock solutions to accelerate the journey to pervasive virtualization and private cloud for organizations of all sizes.
The Vblock partner ecosystem will offer systems integrators and channel partners a business and technical solution on-ramp to private cloud infrastructures. Click here to read commentary from systems integrators and channel partners participating in this ecosystem.
Vblock Infrastructure Packages support a broad range of operating systems and applications, enabling partners and customers to rapidly migrate existing applications to Vblock, accelerating broad-scale virtualization and time to results.
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