This week’s VMworld in Las Vegas has many pundits chatting about Cisco and virtualization, including George Gilbert, principal of IT consulting TechStrategy Partners, who ponders on how Cisco could help plug the gaps in VMware’s products. Gilbert suggests Cisco could enhance its Nexus 5000 switch to enable VMware disaster recovery and high availability software automate the movement of servers, storage and associated network connections to a backup site or to additional capacity.
He writes:
The Nexus 5000 already virtualizes the I/O between a server and the data and SAN networks. It takes one big Ethernet pipe from the server (2 for redundancy) and then delivers separate connectivity to data and SAN networks. (Starts 3Leaf and Xsigo offer this functionality and supposedly Brocade is close behind).
Some have suggested that Cisco could go so far as adding VMware VMs to server blades in its switch. we think that’s unlikely because it would create instant enemies out of HP, IBM, and Dell and motivate them to elevate competitive offerings. We think a more plausible alternative is to tip toe up to the point of adding full server capabilities.
While VMware struggles with “primitive” management and automation of business services, Gilbert writes that Cisco could offer up its VFrame mangement and automation product. However, “From what we’ve heard, Cisco’s own IT operation doesn’t run it and the sales force never warmed up to it,” he adds.
Here are some more blogger speculation about Cisco’s announcements at VMworld:
What’s Cisco’s next move in the virtualized data center?Cisco to Support VMware?
What can we expect to see from Cisco in the data center? Aside from the belief by investment firm UBS that Cisco could be looking to enter the blade server market, Replicate Technologies CEO Rich Miller believes Cisco this week will unveil a “fully virtualized distributed switch as part of the Nexus family.”
Cisco Systems will support VMware virtual machines on their networking hardware? There’s buzz around Silicon Valley that there will be a big announcement made at VMworld next week in Las Vegas, and that’s my prediction as to what it will be. The integration of virtual machines and networking, which was signaled last year when Cisco invested heavily in VMware just prior to the virtualization company’s IPO, would have numerous ramifications, not only for the two companies, but the networking industry overall.
VMWare ESX on a Cisco Network Module?
Could it be? I just read this over at GigaOm and I think Allan’s missing the boat. Now, I’m sure he’s tapped into a lot more resources than I am, but it just doesn’t seem right. I could see Cisco wanting to see how they can help in the data center to make VMWare a better platform than it already is. The VMotion technology already works very well, but what’s to stop Cisco from putting some performance hooks in their secret sauce to make it that much better than Juniper. Also, considering their push into SAN technologies it’s really not a stretch. I have a different thought.
this whitepaper @ cisco.com contains more acronyms than you can shake a stick at, but clearly paints the picture of what their vision is in a microsoft shop running exchange 2007. now after reading that article, I would boil it down, to wow, that is alot of infrastructure for email! why not just get a gmail account 🙂
VMWorld 2008: “Introducing Cisco’s Virtual Switch for VMware ESX”…
It’s the night before VMworld 2008 and the Technology Exchange/Partner day begins and I’m pawing through the stuff in my bag, separating the “keep it” from the “toss it” schwag. There’s an innocuous little flyer stuffed in the bag on Cisco letterhead titled “Introducing Cisco’s Virtual Switch for VMware ESX.” Fantastic.
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