Converged infrastructure platforms have enjoyed great popularity in the last several years. IT organizations realize that leveraging the tight integration of servers, storage and networks in a converged infrastructure platform frees them for more value-added work of aligning IT services with business requirements and laying a foundation for hybrid cloud.
EMC’s experience is that getting converged infrastructure deployments right has less to do with technology integration and more to do with the operational, organizational, and procedural integration. Since these platforms are pre-configured in the factory, it’s possible to stand up the equipment in hours versus the days or weeks it used to take with traditional infrastructure, so that IT can focus on the value-added applications and processes that will run on the platform.
David Goulden,Chief Executive Officer of EMC Information Infrastructure, recently said that if he were building a data center today, “…converged infrastructure and Hybrid Cloud architecture would be the only way to go.”
So if you’re thinking about deploying a hybrid cloud, you’ll find that you can derive substantial benefits from leveraging a converged infrastructure into your cloud services strategy, IT operational processes, and cloud workload priorities.
So, successful converged infrastructure deployment is not merely installing the platform in your environment. It also means aligning processes and IT services delivered to the business with the new converged infrastructure foundation. Operational processes and toolsets must be optimized for cloud, converged infrastructure platforms must be running the right set of applications, and be ready to deliver hybrid cloud services which the business can readily consume.
Business users will become frustrated if they can’t get the services they need in a timely fashion, which means they’ll go around IT and source services from public cloud providers on their own—creating a “shadow IT” scenario. Once IT can deliver services quickly and efficiently, understand the cost of services and provide charge back or memo back, the specter of shadow IT quickly fades. Converged infrastructure can provide that standardization and streamlining of operations and service delivery.
Want to learn more about ways to accelerate your cloud with converged infrastructure? Visit EMC’s Vblock Enablement Services to understand how to get the most from your Vblock System investment.
