DH2i Company, recently named a Cool Vendor by Gartner in the "Cool Vendors in Servers and Virtualization, 2015 1st report, today announced the industry's first Containers as a Service (CaaS) solution for Microsoft SQL Server. The new CaaS offering enables SQL Server customers to plug-into DH2i's award-winning DxEnterprise container management software in the cloud, in a simple, safe and smart manner. DH2i is tapping Rackspace, the #1 managed cloud company, to back its CaaS solution with industry-leading cloud uptime and customer service.

The release of DH2i's CaaS for Microsoft SQL Server presents a giant leap forward in the business model for using SQL Server in the cloud by enabling users to deploy Windows Server applications in the cloud at 50% the cost of standard cloud offerings-with built-in high availability (HA) and easier manageability. With DH2i CaaS, SQL Server DBAs, IT Managers and Directors, and Solution Architects can containerize and stack any new or existing Windows Server application service, file share or SQL Server instance. DH2i CaaS delivers built-in HA and disaster recovery (DR) readiness with containerized workload mobility. In addition, health and performance quality of service (QoS) and alerting management is included, as well as portable NTFS storage container volume and disk management. DH2i CaaS supports Windows Server 2008R2 through 2016, and can manage SQL Server instances version 2005 to 2016-of any edition-in any combination.

"The idea of ‘containers' is a much talked about and generally accepted practice in numerous IT environments. However, there remains a number of adoption barriers for IT professionals. These range from a simple lack of understanding to the inability to pursue new technology because higher priority maintenance activities and fire fighting consume so much time. Barriers can also include a general resistance to significant change, budget challenges, and competitive blocks," said George Crump, Founder and Consulting Analyst, Storage Switzerland. "By taking DH2i's container to the cloud, DH2i is overcoming these barriers, and in doing so, providing business organizations with the ability to easily leverage containers and enjoy their benefits. These include better agility, faster innovation, increased productivity, higher availability and lower costs."

"As the leading managed cloud company, Rackspace strives to provide customers like DH2i with the expertise and service to manage the backend IT infrastructure, so they can focus on growing and innovating their core business with products like DH2i CaaS," said Jeff DeVerter, chief technologist for the Microsoft business unit at Rackspace. "With Rackspace support for Microsoft Private Cloud and dedicated servers, Rackspace enables DH2i to seamlessly deliver its container management services to customers. We're thrilled that DH2i has chosen Rackspace as its trusted infrastructure provider, and we look forward to a continued collaboration."

"DH2i CaaS for SQL Server enables our customers to fully exploit the cloud's fractional consumption and predictable scale," said Don Boxley, CEO and Co-Founder, DH2i. "In traditional cloud deployments, SQL Server often falls victim to sprawl. Running a 24×7 production environment becomes complicated, SLAs are virtually impossible to deliver, and costs skyrocket." He continued, "DH2i CaaS enables customers to bypass internal roadblocks and get their SQL workloads up and running quickly - spinning up a SQL Server workload in the cloud within hours instead of weeks. DH2i CaaS offers its InstanceMobility, allowing users to move any SQL Server instance from any host, to any host, anywhere - with near zero downtime; with three-to-four times fewer OSs. Of course, DH2i CaaS also delivers built-in HA and DR readiness, all at the lowest possible TCO." He concluded, "If you're deploying one SQL instance per virtual machine, its not DH2i CaaS for SQL Server."

The DH2i CaaS solution, which is ideal for SMB to enterprise customers, leverages DxEnterprise which features a first-of-its-kind container technology that enables workload and data portability and high availability for any SQL Server instance, Windows service or file share. This pioneering container technology creates a framework for orchestrating datacenter management, high availability/disaster tolerance and policy-based SLA management. DxEnterprise is the only Windows container technology that leverages native Windows file system (NTFS) and shared or replicated storage technology to coordinate access to a pool of disk resources in the cluster. This enables consistent disk presentation no matter which host the container is active on. DxEnterprise can support any current version or edition of SQL Server and OS across any physical, virtual or hybrid infrastructure.

Pricing and Availability

The DH2i CaaS solution is available now with "Starter Kit" pricing starting as low as $495 a month for five containers, a two-node active-active cluster and 24x7x365 managed services. To view a DxEnterprise product tour visit: http://dh2i.com/product-tour-and-free-trial/containers-as-a-service/.