Category Archives: Cloud Servers

Centrica Selects HP for $400 Million Technology Migration

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HP Enterprise Services UK Limited today announced that Centrica plc has signed a seven-year outsourcing services agreement worth more than $400 million.

With the new agreement, HP will enable Centrica to move to a utility-based private cloud computing environment that will support Centrica’s change program, improve speed of deployment, help lower costs and support the company’s environmental objectives.

“Centrica is striving to improve our ability to respond to market changes to supply gas and electricity to homes and businesses more efficiently,” said Dave Bickerton, group chief information officer, Centrica. “We value HP’s utility computing capabilities and quality solutions that are flexible, cost-effective and help reduce our carbon footprint.”

HP will deliver Utility Services that support Centrica’s migration to a private cloud- and utility-based computing environment enabling greater flexibility to reliably respond to changing business conditions. Centrica will have access to next-generation technology with just the right computing capacity to meet its needs with minimum cost and environmental impact. Centrica also will have access to HP’s enterprise cloud-computing services to enable better data access and new products and services for its customers.

HP will provide these services from two of its data centres in the United Kingdom, including one in Wynyard cited by the Uptime Institute for its eco-friendliness. Centrica will benefit from remote data centre support delivered from HP Best Shore global delivery centres in India, Malaysia and the Philippines. Centrica also will use considerable project and applications services from HP to support the Centrica-led migration.

“The utility industry around the world is making great strides using technology to support an Instant-On enterprise that gives businesses and consumers more control over their energy usage and utilities more options in how they deliver energy,” said Mike Nefkens, senior vice president and general manager, HP Enterprise Services – EMEA. “The combination of HP’s technology and services – such as cloud computing – helps us create the innovative, integrated, end-to-end solutions customers like Centrica need to more effectively and efficiently achieve market, cost and environmental objectives.”

In a world of continuous connectivity, the Instant-On Enterprise embeds technology in everything it does to serve customers, employees, partners and citizens with everything they need, instantly.

HP creates new possibilities for technology to have a meaningful impact on people, businesses, governments and society. The world’s largest technology company, HP brings together a portfolio that spans printing, personal computing, software, services and IT infrastructure to solve customer problems. More information about HP is available at http://www.hp.com.

Hybrid Cloud Solution Unveiled By StratoGen

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VMware hosting company StratoGen today announced the launch of its eagerly awaited hybrid cloud solution. Working with VMware, StratoGen are once again first to market with a solution that enables organisations to seamlessly move virtual machines from their own infrastructure into the StratoGen cloud.

For the first time organisations can integrate their in-house VMware infrastructure with that of their virtual datacentre hosted in the StratoGen public cloud. Moving virtual machines back and forth between both environments can be achieved in a single click. By complementing their own virtualised servers with on demand capacity from the StratoGen cloud, organisations can add significant performance and resilience benefits to their IT operations.

The solution is based on technology from VMware including vCloud Director and vCloud Connector.

Mark Lewis, Business Development Manager said “StratoGen have been working with VMware for some time with vCloud Connector and are hugely excited to be the first to offer these features. We are seeing a new generation of cloud user that is fully leveraging cloud capacity and this service is what they have been crying out for. The ability to take a virtual machine running on local hardware and seamlessly push it out onto the StratoGen cloud is amazing.”

Hosted VMware environments from StratoGen take the form of a virtual datacentre with a pool of available resources such as CPU, RAM, storage and firewalls. Organisations can easily build and deploy configurations that mirror their in-house platform, opening up a whole host of possibilities including disaster recovery and load balancing.

Karl Robinson, Managing Director commented “What we are now seeing is the next wave of innovation that will ensure cloud computing is dominant in the coming years. The ability to push workloads between clouds is a reality today and I’m delighted to say that StratoGen have been at the forefront of its development.”

For further information on VMware hosting from StratoGen visit http://www.stratogen.net/products/vmware-hosting.html

StratoGen is a leading VMware hosting company with a worldwide client base and award winning cloud platform. StratoGen hosted VMware products include a 100% uptime service level guarantee.

Next Generation Cloud Hosting Service Launched

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Leading VMware hosting provider StratoGen today announced the launch of a new generation of cloud hosting service based on VMware vCloud Director.  SHARP™ empowers users to create entire virtual datacentres in the cloud complete with firewalls, networks and virtual machines from a simple web based portal.

Karl Robinson, Managing Director said “This is a stunning new service that turns the cloud hosting market upside down. Whilst first generation cloud hosting services have enabled users to build and configure simple virtual machines, the StratoGen SHARP™ platform hands the full power of our cloud infrastructure over to the user in the form of a virtual datacentre. Within their datacentre customers can build routed networks, deploy and configure firewalls with NAT and DHCP, build vApps and of course deploy highly resilient virtual machines on the VMware hypervisor.”

StratoGen are the first major hosting provider to offer services based on VMware vCloud Director.

David Elliott, Technical Director commented “As a VMware partner, StratoGen were lucky enough to be part of the vCloud Director beta program so we have been working with this software for many months. After our own extensive testing program, we have been hugely impressed with the reliability and sheer power of the product. Advanced features include the ability to create VPNs and load balancing solutions using vShield, which you simply can’t do with any other cloud hosting solution.”

Virtual machines built on the platform can scale to 8 CPUs with 96GB RAM and run virtually any operating system. In addition, pre-built virtual appliances from the VMware virtual appliance marketplace are supported.

The StratoGen service also includes the ability to import virtual machines from existing VMware environments, allowing for a seamless migration from private clouds or other hosting services.

For further information on VMware hosting from StratoGen visit http://www.stratogen.net/prodcucts/vmware-hosting.html

To mark its launch, StratoGen are offering a free 15 day trial of the service.

StratoGen is a leading VMware hosting company with a worldwide client base and award winning cloud platform. StratoGen hosted VMware products include a 100% uptime service level guarantee.

Peak Web Hosting offers solution to holiday server slowdowns

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Peak Web Hosting, a managed hosting and private enterprise cloud provider, have announced its expansion into the Equinix, Washington DC (DC5) International Business Exchange (IBX) data centre campus to optimise the performance of online shopping during the peak holiday season.

The holiday season online traffic peak brings with its celebrations much higher system loads and server errors, network slowdowns and occasional outages. The problems always seem to arrive when traffic is at its highest and staff is on vacation. The surge in e-commerce traffic bogs down countless online retailers and reveals shortcomings in back-end infrastructure and system redundancy. By leveraging bi-coastal data centres with multiple ten-gigabit connectivity options, Peak Web Hosting provides its customers with the redundancy and capacity to accommodate the largest swings in network traffic.

“We take uptime seriously,” explains CEO Jeffrey Papen. “Since its inception, Peak Web Hosting has delivered the scalable, redundant solutions critical to the capacity planning requirements of enterprise production environments, especially at this time of year.”

Despite the recent and challenging economic times, Peak Web Hosting has continued its North American expansion to satisfy customer needs. The clients moving into new data centres are looking for enterprise-class services to provide their organisations flexibility, capacity, and a 100%-uptime commitment. Having access to fully managed hosting and private enterprise cloud environments on both coasts allow clients to take advantage of mission-critical services where uptime and performance are priorities. Peak Web Hosting employs a highly redundant local computing architecture that is easily deployed in multiple data centres.

Founded in 2001, Peak Web Hosting provides comprehensive, managed hosting and private cloud services to enterprise-level clients. Find out more at http://www.peakwebhosting.com.

Nimsoft Unveils New Tool for Rackspace Cloud Monitoring

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Nimsoft have announced the availability of Nimsoft Cloud Monitor, a new tool for monitoring Rackspace cloud-based servers.

Nimsoft leveraged its extensive experience with cloud hosting and collaborated with Rackspace to develop this new tool – which enables customers to track usage, performance and availability of cloud-based servers hosted by Rackspace.

“Cloud-based hosting services are gaining increased adoption because of the cost and flexibility advantages they provide,” said Dennis Callaghan, senior analyst, enterprise software at The 451 Group. “The more organisations are able to integrate performance and availability monitoring of cloud infrastructure services with monitoring of the rest of their IT environments, the better equipped they’ll be to maximise the benefits – as well as the overall performance and availability – of the cloud services they use.”

Nimsoft Cloud Monitor complements the Nimsoft Monitoring Solution (NMS), which enables organisations to monitor and manage a wide range of diverse applications and services, from the data center to the cloud, with a single easy-to-deploy solution.

“Organisations running applications on the server infrastructure hosted by Rackspace need to continually verify that those servers are performing optimally and pro-actively head off any problems that could potentially impact service levels,” said Gary Read, Nimsoft CEO. “With our complimentary Nimsoft Cloud Monitor tool, administrators gain this essential visibility into their cloud infrastructure – while still enjoying all the economic and operational benefits of Rackspace hosting.”

Nimsoft Cloud Monitor offers a broad range of useful capabilities, including:

  • Intuitive, customisable dashboards display key performance metrics, including server bandwidth, disk space, number of bytes in storage accounts, and more.
  • Configurable alarms notify users when problems or potential performance-degrading issues occur.
  • Resource usage monitoring provides current and historical utilisation metrics so users can better understand and control on-going Rackspace cloud costs.
  • Performance monitoring delivers specific metrics and vital insights into the responsiveness of servers and the overall infrastructure.

Nimsoft Cloud Monitor is available via complimentary download at http://www.nimsoft.com/rs/monitoring.php. The Nimsoft Cloud Monitor will be licensed on a no-charge basis for a limited time and the license will terminate upon the conclusion of the free period; additional terms and restrictions apply. The software requires an active Rackspace account to operate and the Nimsoft license does not include any Rackspace services or third party systems required to operate the software.

NB This offer is made to end users located in the United States only.

Nimsoft provides Unified Monitoring solutions for virtualised data centers, hosted and managed services, cloud platforms, and SaaS resources. The Nimsoft Unified Monitoring architecture eliminates the need to deploy a new monitoring solution for outsourced services, public or private clouds, or SaaS implementations. For more information, visit www.nimsoft.com or to see Nimsoft Unified Monitoring in action, visit the Nimsoft public portal at www.unifiedmonitoring.com.

IBM Cloud and Hosting Services Now SAP-Certified

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IBM have announced that SAP AG has certified its capabilities to deliver and manage clients’ implementations of SAP applications via a hosted delivery model and IBM’s Cloud Platforms. The certification enables IBM to provide enterprises around the world with hosted and cloud-based support of the entire SAP solution portfolio, including business software applications for customer relationship management, enterprise resource planning, product lifecycle management, supply chain management and corporate services.

“Clients looking to deploy SAP applications in the cloud can rely on IBM to help them manage, maintain and scale their solution requirements in a safe and secure cloud environment that allows for flexible services and lower operating costs,” said Jim Comfort, IBM’s vice president of Offering Management for its outsourcing business. “Running SAP applications on IBM’s Cloud Platforms and services can help clients meet their business goals, explore new markets and drive growth.”

To achieve these certifications, IBM went through extensive testing by SAP to validate its hosting and cloud computing infrastructures, processes and technical staff. The audit also included a technical review of the physical and logical security processes supporting IBM’s hosting and cloud environments spanning servers, software and storage capabilities.

“The certification of IBM as a global provider of cloud and hosting services confirms its knowledge, experience, capabilities and breadth of services for delivering SAP applications in a hosted, private cloud,” said Kevin Ichhpurani, senior vice president, Business Development and Strategic Alliances, Global Ecosystem and Partner Group, SAP AG. “Customers deploying SAP applications via IBM’s Cloud Platforms can benefit from comprehensive and innovative services that are scalable, provide cost savings, and help them meet their technical and security requirements.”

IBM’s cloud computing offerings support SAP applications and give clients access to templates for faster application development and secure deployment, while improving the cost structure of application management on a usage basis.

For more information about IBM and SAP, visit www.ibm.com/solutions/sap.

Fujitsu Makes Cloud Computing Dynamic

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Fujitsu have announced that it sets new worldwide standards for cloud services with its Global Cloud Platform – and introduces the Dynamic Cloud, a new set of pre-integrated and configured services enabling easier migration to private or hybrid cloud-based services.

Providing a bridge between today’s largely on-premise datacenter infrastructures and tomorrow’s cloud-based delivery models, the new homogeneous Global Cloud Platform underlines Fujitsu’s truly worldwide service delivery capabilities as a trusted and reliable full-scale IT provider.

The Fujitsu Dynamic Cloud gives customers complete control over the critical make-or-break factors for enterprise cloud adoption. By providing policy- and business requirement-based choice over granular factors such as the physical location and future portability of data, Fujitsu removes the major stalling points of compliance and lock-in.

In introducing a new standard for its cloud services around the world, Fujitsu is enabling its customers to better serve their customers. Guaranteed local hosting and data mirroring at strategic points around the world overcomes latency issues for services delivered remotely, enabling ‘anytime, anywhere’ web-based services and on-demand access to applications.

Through global harmonisation, Fujitsu also provides consistency on all elements of cloud including dynamic, agile utilisation, Service Level Agreement (SLA)-based uptime, pricing, billing and support – no matter where in the world they are deployed.

Fujitsu has now completed the build-out of a global network of energy-efficient Tier 3+ data centers offering the highest levels of data protection, reliability of service, and security – enabling the introduction of its Global Cloud Platform. By switching to Fujitsu-hosted cloud services, customers will enjoy full compliance with applicable local legislation, plus peace of mind in terms of the ultimate levels of security and privacy, and SLA-based availability. The first implementations are expected to go live in April 2011.

Dynamic Cloud platform

Fujitsu’s Dynamic Cloud of globally-linked standardised offerings builds on the Infrastructure as a Service offering launched in Central Europe, Middle East, Africa and India (CEMEA&I) in November 2009. As enterprises migrate services, Dynamic Cloud provides easy portability of applications and support for key business processes.

Customers are also freed from the prospect of cloud lock-in. Fujitsu recognises that portability of data across data centers and hosted service providers is critical, therefore also making open Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) available. As businesses continually evaluate where their cloud based business processes belong, and look out for “better, faster, cheaper” solutions, so Fujitsu’s Dynamic Cloud Platform is designed to ensure ease of access and portability of data, both among partners, and in and out of a Fujitsu cloud, when and where needed.

“Completion of the Fujitsu Global Cloud Platform and introduction of the Dynamic Cloud are two huge steps that enable our customers to accelerate their adoption of cloud computing,” says Andre Kiehne, Vice President Services at Fujitsu Technology Solutions. “No matter where you are in the world, Fujitsu now provides a delivery platform for cloud services at a consistent standard – just the same as customers expect from our hardware products. Our Dynamic Cloud is based on this comprehensive framework, and provides cloud-enabling technology by provisioning the right mix of traditional and cloud IT services – as well as cast iron guarantees when it comes to future portability.

“Paying only for the services they use, businesses have the option to ‘try before they buy’ and to quickly implement services that deliver real business value,” says Kiehne. “These combined offerings set Fujitsu apart from other cloud vendors and pave the way for additional layers of cloud services that we are planning for the future – such as platform as a service.”

Fujitsu enables cloud bursting

The new infrastructure enables customers to switch data and services between private and trusted clouds, in a process known as “cloud bursting”. By allowing the exchange of data and seamless interface between private and trusted cloud, and between hosted and on-premise services, customers are able to offload entire IT infrastructures to cloud environments – and start reaping the benefits in terms of cost control and guaranteed service availability.

Fujitsu is demonstrating an “agriculture cloud” at VISIT, the Fujitsu Forum Europe event which takes place in Munich, Germany, on November 24th and 25th. This portrays how traditional farmers are able to make use of our cloud technology to successfully manage their business – and to enable the easier migration of successive generations of farmers, through knowledge and resource sharing.

Fujitsu is a leading provider of ICT-based business solutions for the global marketplace. With approximately 170,000 employees supporting customers in 70 countries, Fujitsu combines a worldwide corps of systems and services experts with highly reliable computing and communications products and advanced microelectronics to deliver added value to customers. Headquartered in Tokyo, Fujitsu Limited (TSE:6702) reported consolidated revenues of 4.6 trillion yen (US$50 billion) for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2010. For more information, visit: www.fujitsu.com

Progressive Infotech becomes Microsoft Cloud Accelerator Partner

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Progressive Infotech, a leading independent provider of IT Infrastructure Solutions and Services today announced that it is Microsoft Cloud Accelerator Partner. This partnership will enable Progressive to generate revenue more efficiently with faster deployments, service customers remotely, and benefit from a recurring revenue stream from the subscription-based offering.

Progressive Infotech, as Microsoft Accelerator Partner will offer Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) solutions to its customers. Microsoft’s BPOS consists of software-as-a-service bundles that organisations access through Microsoft’s server farms. BPOS applications are based on Microsoft Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Communications Online and Office Live Meeting. Progressive will add BPOS to its Professional Service Line, which provides complete cloud computing offerings to organisations.

According to Mr. Prateek Garg, MD & CEO, Progressive Infotech, “We have added another feather to our cap by being a Microsoft Cloud Accelerator partner. This will help us in readily offering our customers the options for moving all or part of on-premises applications to the Web, for extending existing applications’ functionality with new Web-based features, and for enhancing current on-premises operations with the benefits of software-plus-services.”

Benefits to Progressive:

  1. Recurring revenue streams: Due to the nature of the hosted service, Progresive Infotech will be able to generate revenue more efficiently with faster deployments, service customers remotely, and benefit from a recurring revenue stream from the subscription-based offering.
  2. Value-Added Services: Progressive Infotech will provide higher margin, value add services to the customers such as customisation, integration services, and mobility solutions.
  3. Agility: Progressive will have the advantage of development tools, automated service management and global datacenter presence to respond faster to customer needs. Therefore, it can focus more on its competitive differentiators, and reach new markets.

Benefits to End Customers:

  1. Quickly Launch New Products: The organisations’ end customers will be able to bring their products to market faster as their queries qill be responded quickly.
  2. Focus: The organisations will spend more time focusing on the competitive differentiators rather than operational hyrdles.
  3. Money Saving: The organisations will incur less expenditure on the ongoing maintenance and infrastructure costs.

Microsoft and Progressive are well-positioned to offer cloud services that will help the customers to innovate and differentiate while reducing costs. The two companies collaborate on various Microsoft technologies as well. Progressive Infotech is among the few organisations worldwide to have achieved Integrated Quality Management Services encompassing International accreditations for Quality, ITSM & Security.

About Microsoft Cloud Computing – Windows Azure:
Windows Azure is Microsoft’s cloud services operating system that serves as the development, service hosting and service management environment for the Windows Azure platform. Windows Azure provides developers with on-demand compute and storage to host, scale, and manages web applications on the internet through Microsoft datacenters. Microsoft Cloud Accelerate engagement is designed for the most cloud-committed partners. It is for the partners who fulfill a premium level of requirements; their dedication will be rewarded with benefits like a Cloud Accelerate Badge, priority listing in Marketplace, and more. Enterprise organisations unsure about how to explore the potential benefits of cloud computing should empower their top designers, application architects, and IT professionals to test these capabilities now by deploying well-suited new projects and by migrating appropriate existing applications.

About Progressive Infotech
Progressive Infotech is a leading independent provider of IT Infrastructure Services encompassing Provisioning, Integration and Management of IT Infrastructure. Progressive’s services offering span across the IT infrastructure needs of an enterprise and has three strategic business units; Infrastructure Provisioning & Integration, Managed Services and Professional Services. It is the Premier Enterprise Partner of HP and has strategic alliances with all the industry majors and provides IT Infrastructure Management services across the industry verticals. Founded in 1998, the company employs over 1100 associates and operates from its head office in Noida, covering more than 130 locations country wide including regional offices in all major cities like Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Kolkata. For more information about the company, visit www.progressive.in.

Everything You Wanted to know about Cloud Computing

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On 3rd November, Six Degrees in partnership with Amazon Web Services, is organising a technical hands-on event on setting up cloud and its features. The 3-hour workshop will feature the theories of cloud computing and its benefits together with the scalability and it’s cost savings. The programme also contains a hands-on practical session for developers to setup their cloud computing on the spot and live tutorials led by the AWS team – questions relating to setup and cost can also be asked during these sessions.

For more information, see the graphic below, or click here to visit the website at its ridiculously long url.

KDDI Cloud Server Service Uses 3Tera’s AppLogic Cloud Computing Platform

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Japan’s second largest telecommunications carrier launches with the most comprehensive cloud computing solution in the Telco space today

(Aliso Viejo, CA � September 14, 2009) 3Tera, the leading provider of cloud computing technology and utility computing services for hosting providers, today announced that KDDI, Japan’s second largest telecommunications carrier, is using 3Tera’s AppLogic cloud computing platform to deliver the next generation IT platform through their new ‘KDDI Cloud Server Service’ offering.

‘Cloud Computing technology is quickly transforming computing into a utility, making Telcos logical providers for cloud services,’ said Barry X Lynn, Chairman and CEO, 3Tera, Inc. ‘KDDI has a reputation of technology innovation and leadership, so being at the core of their cloud service is a big recognition for the capability of 3Tera’s AppLogic cloud computing platform.’

IDC Japan’s Senior Communications Market Analyst, Akiko Kawakami, points out in her report, ‘KDDI’s Next Generation IT Infrastructure “Cloud Server Service”: Will It Accelerate User Migration to Managed Services?’ (IDC. August, 2009): ‘The field of Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) is receiving much momentum from the fact that no IT assets are needed and it alleviates the work involved in the procurement and introduction of IT infrastructure. IDC believes that KDDI’s new service has what it takes to fulfill the expectations of user companies embracing cloud services.’

Initial offerings include virtual systems and virtual private data centers run at the KDDI Telehouse domestic data centers. This allows KDDI to offer both Infrastructure-as-a-Service and Platform-as a-Service solutions, where customers can run their existing applications on the IT platform or use KDDI’s prepared applications to significantly lower their initial investment and operational costs. Details on the service and pricing are available on KDDI’s official Web site at http://www.kddi.com/business/cloud/index.html

Lynn added, �We are excited to have our distribution and hosting partners in Japan – Net One Systems and Xseed – who by making their expertise available and keeping close contact with the customer were instrumental in the implementation on these new services.�

3Tera�s leading cloud platform, specifically designed for hosting and service providers today, offers Telcos a production-proven turnkey platform, powering data centers around the world. By choosing AppLogic, service providers gain access to additional functionality such as visual applications infrastructure editor, real-time scalability, system resource management, comprehensive monitoring and even critical features such as business continuity, disaster recovery.

About 3Tera, Inc.
3Tera, Inc. is the leading innovator of cloud computing technology and utility computing services, simplifying the deployment and scaling of online applications. Named “Cool Vendor in IT operations, 2008″ by Gartner Group, 3Tera offers AppLogic� , the first commercially available cloud computing platform that completely removes the cost and complexity associated with infrastructure. Available both for building in-house private clouds and as a platform for cloud computing services, AppLogic allows IT professionals to develop and deploy online applications in minutes instead of weeks, using only a browser to manage and scale on demand fully distributed systems and deliver security and business continuity for all applications, while fully controlling their cloud computing environment. For more information, visit www.3tera.com

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3Tera, the 3Tera logo, AppLogic, the AppLogic logo, Cloudware and Cloud Computing without Compromise are trademarks or registered trademarks of 3Tera, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Other company names and marks belong to their respective owners.