Can I rapidly and safely turn my IT into a business growth engine through convergence?

[#1]

I’m pleased to report that through my many customer conversations that I’ve confirmed that most organizations are embarking upon on a convergence journey to up-level their IT’s strategic value to their business – which is great. However, with all the solution choices and “Cloud talk”, it’s clear many of these same organizations are still struggling with how to get started and with what solution. So I thought I’d take the opportunity in this blog to share a typical conversation.

I initially talk about the challenges IT is facing. For example, most enterprises are dealing with less than ideal infrastructures driven by an explosion of information and aging assets. The fact is, most enterprises are still struggling with spending too much of their IT resources on operations, fire drills and activities that just keep the lights on. I phenomena we call ‘IT sprawl’. Next I introduce the HP Converged Infrastructure strategy ... the available solutions ... and I continue with the reality that it’s ‘not one size that fits all’ (there are multiple entry points depending upon the maturity of your IT environment).

That’s the beauty of the HP Converged Infrastructure approach – you can start all at once through a transformational, BIG BANG approach or evolve through a step-by-step project-based or building block approach. I like to think of the HP Converged Infrastructure solution portfolio as your GPS to infrastructure convergence – guiding you to your strategic target in the simplest, fastest, and safest manner possible based upon your preferred vehicle, requirements, pace, process, and budget. This simple picture resonates very well with customers.

I typically start the ‘solution’ conversation with the BIG BANG approach because the customers I meet with understand the urgency of not falling behind the market drivers ... or in some cases exhibiting real leadership by already prioritizing a transformational goal. I introduce the HP line-up of HP Converged Systems (led by the powerful HP CloudSystem).

These systems are like taking a supersonic jet – designed to deliver the fastest time to application value—and time to business success. In the past, BIG BANG meant high costs and a long deployment cycle. Customer’s wanted it, but it wasn’t practical. Oh how things have changed. With the HP Converged Systems portfolio you get the speed, control, and integration by design. HP delivers these systems across the three categories to meet today’s application needs ... HP VirtualSystem, HP CloudSystem, and HP AppSystems ... enabling any enterprise to quickly eliminate islands of incompatible IT while addressing their application needs in a common way—whether it’s in a virtual, cloud or dedicated application environment.

Words like ‘infrastructure optimization’, ‘data center virtualization’, ‘flexible and fast service delivery’, and ‘cost management’ are no longer buzz phrases. Instead, these concepts are realities delivered through these systems – all built on a common open architecture, with common management and a common security model ... extended by an industry-standard and open partner ecosystem. The ultimate in flexibility and simplicity.

Of course cloud is a particularly hot topic. With cloud models becoming more and more appealing for fast-growing businesses needing on-demand service delivery that can easily scale up IT capacity to keep pace with growth; I typically introduce the HP CloudSystem as the ideal solution to get to the cloud in a predictable, secure manner.

The out-of-the-box cloud-bursting is particularly attractive. It allows access to resources at certified CloudSystem bursting partners to meet peak capacity needs by simply selecting the bursting service within the CloudSystem when deploying a service. Plus, the HP CloudSystem also offers multivendor flexibility that simplifies management (e.g. provision heterogeneous infrastructure from a single portal). If you are unsure how to get started, many customers are attending the HP Cloud Discovery Workshop as the ideal way to build your roadmap for which apps are ready to move to the cloud.

When looking for a quick and safe way to turn your IT into a business growth engine, the HP Converged Systems portfolio really is unmatched. However, many organizations are still concerned about protecting their current IT infrastructure investments. In fact, this is where most organizations are gaining ground on the inefficiencies of IT sprawl. Modular, standards-based technology building blocks—all designed for convergence – provide a quick path to convergence value.

Just one example is the new HP Converged Storage line-up. With legacy storage simply too expensive, complex, and isolated for today's requirements, HP Converged Storage enables you to scale storage faster, reduce IT service delivery time to minutes, spend way less time managing storage, and cut power, cooling, and even floor-space. To learn more, here is a great podcast – why now, what is it, and what are the benefits.

I know this is an oversimplification, but the fact is that the 'convergence' conversation is a regular customer occurance these days - with businesses looking for the best way forward. Either approach - BIG BANG or Building Block - you CAN start right now turning your IT into a business growth engine through convergence.

Below are a few other areas to explore as you continue your discovery efforts around infrastructure convergence:

• Accelerate time to appreciation value: HP Converged Systems HP Brochure
• Simplify delivery of virtualized, cloud and next-generation applications HP feature article
• Transform your data center infrastructure to meet the enterprise agility challenge HP feature article
• HP Cloud Computing Solutions portal
• Check out the BIG activities planned for VMWorld in a few weeks
• Or call upon HP Converged Infrastructure services if you need help

Thanks,

Duncan

[#2]

Is this the same big bang theory that happened to creat homosapiens? If so we should be scared because computers will start walking after this big bang!

Great article HP.