The Growing List of Cloud Enabling Platforms

Understanding the Cloud Enabling Platform

Some readers may know that the Neovise website provides a number of resources for finding, understanding and selecting cloud computing services as well as cloud enabling technologies. Within the pages of the above resources link there is a page called IaaS Enabling Platforms.

Platforms? As in platform as a service (PaaS). Nope. PaaS platforms provide the capability to develop and deploy consumer-created applications using programming languages and tools supported by the PaaS provider (e.g., java, python, .Net).

Instead, IaaS enabling platforms enable the creation and / or delivery of infrastructure as a service (IaaS). The resulting IaaS offering provides the capability to provision processing, storage, networks, and other fundamental computing resources. The users of the IaaS offering may then run arbitrary software, which can include operating systems and applications.

Some vendors who sell these IaaS enabling platforms refer to them as cloud management software. I see their point and don’t take any major exception to that approach to categorizing or naming. After all, the software does control or manage underlying hardware and other IT resources. However, I prefer the notion of the cloud enabling or IaaS enabling platform. This is mostly because the end result – the cloud services – does not really exist until the enabling software is deployed. IaaS enabling platforms are what turn physical and virtual IT resources into elastic cloud resources so they can be delivered as services.

Public cloud providers as well as internal IT departments use IaaS enabling platforms as an alternative to building their own IaaS capabilities from scratch. On the other hand, many of the large cloud computing service providers have built their own IaaS platforms. This requires significant resources, longer time to market and technical capabilities which the “would be cloud provider” may simply not have.

The Growing List of Cloud Enabling Platforms

Over recent weeks, the number of available IaaS enabling platforms has been growing. If you looked at the link already mentioned above (to the IaaS Enabling Platforms), you saw there are already at least eight solutions listed. There are still more to be added and surely more currently under development. You can learn more by clicking on the individual solution profiles as well as clicking through to the various vendor websites. Some of what you may find includes:

• Target Markets: Some platforms are designed for building internal clouds (e.g. enterprise IT), some for public clouds (e.g. hosting service providers) and others for both.
• Service Provider Vendors: Some of the vendors of these platforms are also service providers. Voxel, Joyent and Flexiant are all cloud service providers that are now also licensing the platforms they initially built for offering their own cloud services. This is a relatively new and very interesting development to the competitive landscape.
• Independent Software Vendors (ISV): The slight majority of vendors are exclusively software vendors (and not service providers).
• ISV Types: Some of the ISVs are pure plays – focused exclusively on cloud enabling platforms. Others provide other software such as IT management or HPC / Cluster software. For instance, CA is one of the Big 4 IT management vendors. IT management vendor participation is also a relatively new and very interesting development that will surely result in more changes in the competitive landscape.
• Heritage: Some vendors grew their offerings from existing capabilities. Note that Abiquo, Platform Computing and Univa UD all leveraged earlier strengths in HPC. Some acquired a company to gain entry into the market. Other built their offerings from scratch.
• Open Source: Some vendors offer (or have offered) open source versions of their solutions.
• Infrastructure Vendors: Infrastructure vendor Dell is partnering with Joyent to offer internal clouds based on Dell servers. Another major hardware vendor is rumored to be partnering with a pure play cloud ISV to strengthen its ability to deliver internal clouds through its services organization. Participation in the cloud enabling platform market by major infrastructure vendors has more potential to disrupt the competitive landscape.
• Capabilities and Maturity: As always, there is quite a range of capabilities and corresponding maturity across the spectrum of providers. For instance, there are great differences in the variety of hypervisors as well as physical servers supported by these solutions. And don’t forget storage and networking capabilities.

Summing it up

The list of vendors (and service providers) offering IaaS enabling platforms is growing rapidly. Unfortunately, not all of these vendors will succeed.

Neovise also expects the moves by several of these vendors to change the competitive landscape as well as impact the selection and purchase criteria of IT organizations and service providers.

Those purchasing cloud enabling platforms need to understand each of the items noted in the bullet points above in order to choose the right solution. There are also many other considerations which are not listed. Service providers will need to consider the competitive implications of using an IaaS enabling platform versus building their own. Enterprise organizations will need to consider the fit with existing tools and processes.

Not to worry too much… there is also clear value to be found – whether cost savings, agility or others – when implementing a cloud with the right platform.