Microsoft Expands Virtualization Initiatives With HP

Companies offering products, training and deployment services for storage, networking and server consolidation; joint sales programs aimed at lowering customers’ IT costs and accelerating business responsiveness.

REDMOND, Wash. — Microsoft Corp. today announced expanded product, sales and services initiatives with HP aimed at helping businesses more easily adopt and deploy virtualization to help lower information technology (IT) costs and make IT more efficient. Microsoft has expanded its work together with HP to sell and market storage, server and networking consolidation solutions and desktop virtualization solutions to small-, medium-sized- and large-business customers worldwide.

Today’s announcements include the following:
• In the U.S., Microsoft is working with HP to offer products, training and deployment services for storage, networking and server consolidation that are designed to help customers decrease costs, increase business agility, improve data access and protection, and increase employee productivity.
• Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 and Microsoft System Center are supported on the new industry-standard HP Virtual Connect 10Gb Flex-10 module, which works with the Flex-10 NIC on the recently introduced HP ProLiant BL495c virtualization blade server. Together these technologies help enable customers to significantly lower costs with their server and network consolidation, business continuity, and dynamic datacenter projects.
• The HP and Microsoft Frontline Partner Program in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) has registered 60 percent of eligible partners across 36 countries to receive access to virtualization training, sales tools, marketing materials, workshops, and incentives targeting small and medium-sized businesses.
• Performance and Resource Optimization (PRO) features will be delivered in the HP ProLiant PRO Management Pack for Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager, running on HP ProLiant and BladeSystem servers, in December 2008. PRO is a feature of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 that enables dynamic management of virtual machines and the associated host platforms.
• HP provides comprehensive services, built on Microsoft technologies, for customers to virtualize their desktops and data centers. The services address strategy, design, transition, operation and continual improvement. HP offers virtualization workshops and proofs-of-concept as the first step for virtualization projects. HP also provides education and support for technology staff as well as services to develop a strategic technology road map using best practices to consolidate and manage infrastructure.
• HP Business Service Automation will enable automation of change and configuration management processes across virtual and physical environments for Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V environments, and will integrate with System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 for managing advanced platform capabilities, while decreasing downtime associated with uncontrolled change. HP is scheduled to release a beta in the first quarter of 2009.

“Microsoft and HP are working together to help customers obtain more value from their Microsoft virtualization software, HP services and infrastructure offerings,” said Zane Adam, senior director of integrated virtualization, Server and Tools Business at Microsoft. “Customers and partners are responding well to the clear benefits of the joint solutions and initiatives for desktop and datacenter virtualization and holistic management. This response is evident at customers such as MLS Property Information Network among many others, and our initiatives will fuel continued value for new customers.”

MLS Property Information Network Inc. is the largest multiple listing service in New England, serving more than 30,000 real estate professionals with a database of nearly 60,000 active listings. Keeping its Web servers up and running is thus a business-critical goal. The company decided to replace its 60 stand-alone servers with 20 clustered servers supporting dozens of virtual machines that run Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V on HP ProLiant servers and HP Insight Software. At the same time, the company replaced its storage infrastructure with a Sanbolic Melio FS clustered file system that provides Internet Small Computer System Interface (iSCSI) storage using a 10-gigabit Ethernet connection at a substantial cost savings compared with fiber channel storage.

“Virtualization frees the business to grow. We have been able to achieve a dynamic IT infrastructure and can almost double computing capacity on demand across the enterprise, which is huge,” said Matt Lavallee, director of technology, MLS Property Information Network. “We’ve been able to consolidate our infrastructure by 60 percent, and we’ve been able to reduce operational costs by 30 percent, which maximizes value for our shareholders.”

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

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