NonStop Trends & Wins

NonStop – Some Clarification

In visiting customers over the past few months it’s clear that there is some misunderstanding of virtual NonStop.  Many customers have come to the conclusion that virtual NonStop is the future of NonStop.  In other words, they will eventually have to migrate to virtual NonStop.  This is NOT true.  Virtual NonStop is only an option under the L-Series Operating System.  There are roadmap plans for NonStop which are the full, complete, integrated platforms we have always provided.  If you want to acquire a NonStop platform that includes the hardware and software in a complete, integrated and fully tested fashion – you will always be able to do that.  So to be clear, virtual NonStop is an option for NonStop and remains optional.

There are a few reasons to consider virtual NonStop.  You may have corporate standards concerning specific hardware vendors and to be compliant to the standard may require other vendors’ storage, networking or servers.  This may be a reason to consider a virtual NonStop solution.  Additionally, based on the structure and policies of your organization, hardware acquisition may fall into a separate organization, say the private cloud division, where the cost of the NonStop system may be divided by hardware and software.  This may be another opportunity for virtual.  Unless there is some specific need virtual addresses then my recommendation would be to acquire the existing and future platform systems as you always have.

If you follow HPE in the news, you are likely aware of Antonio Neri’s direction of ‘everything as a Service’ direction.  HPE over the next few years will become a company supplying infrastructure and charging for the consumption of that infrastructure.  This is called Greenlake and you will be hearing more about it. See http://hpe.com/greenlake for more information. Greenlake is the architecture for HPE’s move toward a service model in the Industry.  Greenlake is not a fixed platform but something designed and created based on customer requirements and run (at least the platform) for the customer.  NonStop systems can definitely be and have been part of a Greenlake solution.  A Greenlake infrastructure will be required as companies move toward their IT functioning as a private cloud/service company and beyond.

What do I mean by beyond a service company?  To me ‘operating as a service company’ is phase one of a greater strategy, the final outcome which I will call autonomous computing.  Like the autonomous vehicle which will take a person from point A to point B without the person being concerned about the make, model, color or other details of the vehicle, autonomous computing will provide computing on an as-needed and as the anticipated basis for a person and for a company.  This is only possible with a combination of tools that can predict both hardware, software and application ‘events’.  HPE really is beginning the journey to a service-led company by looking at all aspects of the computing platform.  Autonomous computing is the end game but it is still quite a ways off.