NetApp, Microsoft to Enable Service Providers to Take SMBs to the Cloud

NetApp, Microsoft to Enable Service Providers to Take SMBs to the Cloud

Posted Tuesday, July 13, 2010 By ITVARNews Network

By utilizing the Microsoft Dynamic Data Center Toolkit for Hosters, NetApp has announced enhanced integration with Microsoft to deliver enterprise-class data protection solutions to cloud service providers. By this association, the vendors are looking to offer enterprise-class data protection to their SMB customers. Moreover, NetApp also announced the availability of its new professional service offerings and additional resources for service providers to build a variety of enterprise-class cloud services.

SMB customers have many of the same disaster recovery and business continuity requirements as large enterprise organizations, but often times dont have the necessary skill set or budget needed to achieve the desired results, said Laura DuBois, program vice president, Storage Software and Solutions, IDC. Solutions that address this gap by providing enterprise-level data protection along with the support and guidance needed to deploy will be integral in helping SMBs realize the true benefits of a cloud infrastructure, she added.

The Dynamic Data Center Toolkit provides sample code and guidance for building cloud services powered by Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V and the Microsoft System Center Suite. NetApp is currently the only storage vendor to integrate seamlessly with the Dynamic Data Center Toolkit.

SMBs are demanding enterprise-class disaster recovery solutions, and hosting service providers are in a tremendous position to fill that demand as more SMBs move toward hosted IT services, said John Zanni, general manager of Worldwide Hosting for the Communications Sector at Microsoft. Were pleased to be working with NetApp as part of the Dynamic Data Center Alliance to enable hosting service providers to offer these disaster recovery solutions and to take another step to move beyond commoditized hosting services to become full-service IT providers to their customers, he commented.

The Microsoft Dynamic Data Center Toolkit allowed us to leverage NetApp technologies, which are a fundamental building block of our Guardian GeoCloud solution, to deliver a unique service and set ourselves apart in the marketplace, said Robert A. Bye, executive vice president at nGenX. Using NetApp storage efficiency technologies such as thin provisioning and deduplication in Microsoft Hyper-V environments helps us maximize infrastructure utilization and lower costs for the end user. As a result, we use 50%-60% less storage than we would otherwise need to support cloud services for our customers. We are really exploding some myths about the affordability of enterprise-class disaster recovery for our customers, Bye added.

Todays announcement extends our already strong relationship with Microsoft to deliver integrated solutions for cloud service providers, said Patrick Rogers, vice president of Solutions and Alliances Marketing, NetApp.

Apart from integrating with Microsoft Toolkit, NetApp also unveiled new consulting offerings and design guidance documentation for Microsoft environments, along with new capabilities to help service providers improve their SLAs.

The pricing of the offerings is available from NetApp sales and reseller partners.