Anybody selling IT infrastructure in the channel these days knows that great change is upon us. There is a shift towards pre-integrated servers that come complete with storage and switches that are being heavily promoted under the concept of data center convergence. The basic idea is that if all these IT infrastructure components are pre-integrated, they will cost less to deploy and manage.
Of course, IT vendors never saw an emerging technology trend that didn’t look like an opportunity to increase their attach rates. So what is happening under the heading of data center convergence is an attempt by Cisco to expand its networking base into the server realm. This naturally led to a response from Oracle in terms of acquiring Sun Microsystems and Hewlett-Packard’s move to acquire 3Com.
Even before these deals, all three companies have been pushing partners to increase their attach rates and as we move into 2010 there will be more pressure than ever. But the question that solution providers should be asking themselves is whether data center convergence will actually come at a cost of their vendor independence. The fact of the matter is that there are several perfectly good software-only approaches to data center convergence that accomplish much the same goal that Cisco and HP are trying to achieve. Furthermore, we’ll see some evolution of various virtualization technology standards that will make it easier to deliver heterogeneous solutions for data center convergence.
What will change, however, is how customers think about acquiring IT infrastructure. Instead of buying servers, storage and switches, customers will evolve their thinking into buying something akin to “data center processing units” where solution providers are asked to deliver sets of discrete pre-integrated components to power a given set of applications. That may require a little more technical savvy on the part of the solution provider. But what it won’t require is the solution provider to sacrifice their vendor independence unless they deem that backing one horse in the data center races is a good idea.
Further on down the road, solution providers can also look forward to the business opportunities afforded by the eventual need customers will have in terms of integrating diverse units of data center processing. In the meantime, solution providers would be well-advised to not panic in the face of the massive amount of sound and fury around data center convergence that will be one of the hallmarks of 2010.
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