Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2015. Read them in this VMblog.com series exclusive.
Contributed article by Kieran Harty, CTO of Tintri
2015 Outlook – Cloud, OpenStack, Service Providers and More
Software Innovation in Storage Unlocks the Hardware Innovations of the Last 5 Years.
Not long ago the primary issues plaguing storage were performance and
cost. Those issues have been tackled with hardware innovations,
including flash, multicore and 10 GB Ethernet. Now the obstacle is data
management, which is still abstracted in LUNs, volumes and other legacy
concepts. Since the business thinks in VMs, the natural solution is to
manage storage in VMs. The resulting visibility, automation and
analytics unlocks the full capabilities of the hardware. Consider
tablets-the hardware technology was available, but it was the simplicity
of management (iPad / iOS) that transformed the market. In 2015,
storage software will spark the beginnings of a similar transformation.
IT Generalists Can Manage Storage.
Conventional storage is hard to manage and requires specialists steeped
in LUNs, volumes, RAID, etc. As a result, storage has become a black
box, expensive and hard to manage. But the silos of IT are being broken
down, and so in 2015 IT generalists - virtualization admins, system
engineers and software developers - will start to take ownership of
their server, virtualization AND storage requirements. In turn, that
elevates the storage admin to working on projects with more strategic
value than carving up LUNs and volumes.
Democratization of Cloud (It's Not Just About Amazon and Google Any More).
Rising security risks, lack of a strong economic case for large-scale
deployment and the continuing challenge of adapting enterprise
applications to the cloud force companies to explore private cloud. Many
of the capabilities of public cloud will become available in the
private cloud-allowing companies to realize scale, security, automation,
data protection and, ultimately, cost savings. Service providers will
quickly grow to service the private clouds of organizations that don't
want to run their own infrastructure.
OpenStack Gets Real. OpenStack
has been a point of discussion since 2010, but in 2015 it's become very
real. IBM, HP, Cisco, Red Hat, Oracle and VMware all support OpenStack,
prompting many companies to start looking at OpenStack seriously. The
momentum will start in Software Development (specifically DevOps) where
the flexibility / agility of OpenStack is most compelling. Once value is
realized it will naturally spread to other parts of the enterprise.
Customers Look for Differentiated Flash Products. In
2015, customers will realize that buying basic flash-based storage
doesn't provide a lot of value, and it doesn't address the root cause of
data center pain. Why? Because flash performance without baked-in
intelligence will be table stakes in 2015-companies will see that
driving an orange Ferrari while wearing a blindfold is cool for a short
time, but not very bright in the end. So, they'll demand total
visibility (GPS in our metaphor) into individual VMs; and any flash
provider that forces companies to continue to think in LUNs, volumes,
etc. will quickly lose its shine.
Service Providers Turn to Storage as a Competitive Advantage. Cloud service
providers compete on speed and reliability. In the past that has put
the focus on their network. But smart providers have realized that
storage can have greater amplification of their performance. They'll
turn to storage that removes guesswork allowing for precise pricing,
quality of service guarantees and happier customers. Storage providers
that build upon these sources of differentiation will be best positioned
to capture the private cloud opportunity (per above).
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About the Author
Kieran
is the Chief Technology Officer and co-founder of Tintri. Prior to
becoming CTO, Kieran served as CEO and Chairman of Tintri. Kieran has a
Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University and a Master's
Degree in Computer Science from Trinity College Dublin.