Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2013. Read them in this VMblog.com series exclusive.
Contributed article by David Grimes, Chief Technology Officer, NaviSite
More Acceleration and Acceptance of as-a-Service
As 2012 comes to a close, we look back
on a year where many enterprises have made fundamental shifts in their approach
to IT. No longer simply testing the waters, nor limited to the needs of
dev/test, we've seen a truly staggering rate of adoption of cloud services.
The industry has continued to provide mature, scalable core virtualization technologies with an
increasingly powerful and efficient management capability. Many software
vendors have adapted "cloud friendly" licensing terms, and many workloads
previously thought to be inherently incompatible with virtualization have been
shown to run as well or even better in a cloud environment.
With everything we've already seen over the past few years,
and specifically in 2012, what's next?
- Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) cloud will be
more widely accepted as the natural evolution of "traditional" IT
outsourcing. Managed service providers will increasingly turn to cloud
internally to meet their own infrastructure needs, thereby improving delivery
cycles, enhancing service levels, and increasing efficiency.
- IaaS cloud will continue to evolve at an
accelerated pace with 2013 marking the year of the "Software Defined
Datacenter". By combining the proven record of virtualized compute, the
promises of software defined networking, and the maturity of management tools
and API's, the IT transformation which began with virtualization will be nearly
complete. This API-enabled, elastic, resilient platform will provide developers
the foundation for a new generation of applications which will ultimately
change the way companies do business.
- Solid State storage will reach an inflection
point in terms of availability, reliability, and cost. While solid state
will not supplant spinning media storage quickly, it will play a starring role
in 2013 as the industry sees both a continued migration of mission critical,
and performance sensitive workloads to the cloud, as well as the proliferation
of "big data" analytics.
- Adjacent "as-a-Service" offerings such as
Desktop-as-a-Service, Database-as-a-Service, and Backup-as-a-Service will
become widely available as service providers seek to differentiate in an
increasingly competitive landscape. These additional "as-a-Service"
offerings will also accelerate cloud adoption more generally due to the
enhanced value proposition of combining complementary solutions.
- IT human resources will be compelled to adapt to
a rapidly changing world. Gone are the days where singular focus and deep
vertical expertise were the keys to success; tomorrow's IT resources must
embrace a multi-disciplinary approach. While this may be seen as a threat
by many, the reality is that IT as an industry is being presented with an
opportunity to add value to the business they support, rather than simply
"keeping the lights on."
As exciting as the past few years have been, all of us in
the IT industry should be prepared to fasten our seat belts ... this ride is
far from over.
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About the Author
As NaviSite's Chief Technology Officer, David Grimes is an innovative technology visionary responsible for the strategic direction of the company's architecture and solutions. He has been instrumental in leading both the design and development of the NaviCloud platform. A leader focused on continuous process improvement through new and enabling technologies, David frequently meets with customer's to gain market knowledge, evangelize NaviSite's vision and develop solutions.