More Fuel To Put On The Data Center Fire. . .

Competition is an incredible driver of innovation and strong newcomers to any market often have the ability to act and move quickly.  In the Internet age and more importantly modern era of content being king, the cracks in the network have collided the computing at the edge world with the dumb network yielding this open landscape of an Intelligent Internet.  We will see it in many forms from Cloud Computing (http://www.ibm.com/news/us/en/2008/09/24/h700006x16255w91.html) to Intelligent Content Based Routing in the network (http://www.crn.com/networking/207000296) to next generation data center initiatives with grand and glorious names.  The simple fact is that the data center is no longer and end point but is moving to a central role in the network.  At the same time, the network must be more capable of performing new tasks with the flexibility to change quickly.  In a world of purpose built devices, this sounds a lot like software.  So much so that recent blogs hinted of Cisco thinking of offering blade servers in packaging similar to the Nexus systems (http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/091508-cisco-blade-server.html).

To be fair, I must admit that I am quite biased to believe that the open blade server platforms will engulf routing and switching as delivering services and solutions within the network become a core offering.  With the enterprise economics and volume, data center economonics will win out in the end just like the PC beat down the mainframes and mid-ranges.  While we have had a few friends whom have helped us greatly along the way (http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/info/bladecenter/pn41/index.html), we are just at the beginning of the battle.  For those of us in the networking industry, adding more processing ability deeper into the network isn’t new or rocket science, but developing new services in compelling and manageable ways while ensuring the robustness and scalability of the network is true heavy lifting.  Where the market turns in the end is up for grabs, but the chance to watch first hand for all of us is going to be a great ride.

The Data Center War Is On, Should We Care?

When I think of the big battles for market share in technology, what comes to mind is Microsoft versus Apple, IBM versus HP, and Intel versus AMD.  We have watched these come and go and be drawn out to move the marketing messages and market share needles.  But many of these are very much like title fights where two giants are fighting in their weight class against the expected contenders in a controlled arrangement.  Once in a while we see new players enter the market who want to take on the establishment in new and different ways similar to Skype taking on the long distance industry.  Rarely, however, do we get to see two dominant forces in adjacent and often complementary markets turn their focus on one another.  Enter the new Internet data center and how 12 months can dramatically change the landscape.  Networking incumbent Cisco is leading the charge expanding ownership of the data center by targeting the bread and butter of its partners, IBM and HP.  Likewise, IBM and HP have seen the opportunity to help drive revenue and efficiency in telecom sector by driving servers further into the network core.  So is this a good thing and should we care?

Cisco Nexus

http://gigaom.com/2008/03/21/coming-soon-the-cisco-blade-server/

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps9402/index.html

IBM Bluehouse targets Webex:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=10296

https://bluehouse.lotus.com/front/webfront

Welcome

Welcome,

The CloudShield blog is intended to help you stay informed about key industry trends across networking, security, and IP protocols. In the future we will regularly be posting about product updates, new features, tips & tricks, customer success stories, and the evolving network intelligence landscape.

There’s plenty to discuss about current events (typically this will be Monday’s topic) and the increased demand for intelligent processing that is needed to manage services and subscribers, ensure quality and optimize performance in today’s mixed-traffic converged networks (likely to be covered on Wednesday’s  topics) – and the CloudShield team would love to hear your thoughts as well!

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Background:

Headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, CloudShield is a provider of IP service control and infrastructure protection solutions deployed on CloudShield’s multi-function, multi-use network and content processing platforms.