OpenStack has changed the cloud computing landscape and become the standard base for nearly every provider
InfoWorld's Eric Knorr made a good
call last week, stating, "IBM would take the helm as the corporate steward
of OpenStack, surpassing in importance even Rackspace -- which along with NASA
gave birth to OpenStack three years ago."
Although IBM won't provide its own OpenStack-based product, it will offer
piece-parts based on OpenStack. IBM's sheer size and influence will make it one
of the biggest drivers of OpenStack, passing up Hewlett-Packard, Rackspace, and
dozens of other smaller OpenStack upstarts. Remember how IBM was a major force
in mainstreaming Linux and open source a decade ago? It has the same
potential with OpenStack.
Of course, IBM isn't the only 800-pound gorilla seeing opportunity in
OpenStack. Last week Oracle
acquired Nimbula, an OpenStack-based hybrid/private cloud technology
provider. Most cloud market watchers, including me, believe Oracle is seeking
core skills more than core technology -- in this case, OpenStack and Amazon Web
Services expertise.
OpenStack officially launched on July 18, 2010, and its popularity rose
quickly at larger enterprises seeking quick entry to the cloud computing market,
such as HP, Dell, IBM, and now Oracle. Many small companies are also looking to
OpenStack as a way to get their product to market using an existing code base.
They are also providing products with more intrinsic market value based on
tapping into both the OpenStack hype and its user acceptance.
You can even look at the fall -- and in some cases, the demise -- of several
private cloud technology providers that predated the release of OpenStack. They
did (or, more likely, could) not dial OpenStack into their product road maps,
and the market pushed them aside.
There are a few reasons for the success and interest in OpenStack:
- OpenStack promises cloud interoperability and portability.
- OpenStack is not Amazon.com, VMware, or Microsoft.
- OpenStack is based on "open standards."
- OpenStack caught the interest of the big guys, including IBM and HP, that still drive enterprise IT sales.
- OpenStack has improved greatly since 2010.
OpenStack is not perfect. Although there is a somewhat common code base for
core IaaS offerings, interoperability and portability are not yet proven.
Moreover, most of the vendors leveraging OpenStack, including Dell, have rightly
complained that the code base is immature and needs more work before it becomes
useful. Finally, there is the likelihood that larger OpenStack vendors will take
it in their own proprietary directions, thus diminishing the value of its "open
standards."
Still, as long as OpenStack adoption continues to grow, the technology is
likely to mature to meet all those expectations -- mine included.
By: David Linthicum
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