Virtualization : Virtual Reality

The complexity of the IT infrastructure has grown multi-fold and the number
of users on a network has also grown exponentially. The computer has moved from
a personal computing device to an enterprise machine.

This is why it is not surprising that most companies spend close to 85
percent of their IT budgets in managing the infrastructure. A large part of this
is actually taken up in managing endpoints.

This is where virtualization makes a gallant entry. A virtualized platform
can help enterprises to deliver application service from their data center to
any end point, faster and economically. It helps to reduce IT costs while
increasing the efficiency, utilization and flexibility of a company's existing
computer hardware by optimizing IT resources.

The early adopters

Different folks have varying thoughts about who were the early adopters of
virtualization. Aman believes in India the first to bite the bullet were
software houses as it gave them the flexibility they needed to run programs and
then discard them if they didn't need it.

Ganesh Mahabala, Regional Director, VMware India and SAARC believes that the
technology users are spread across industry verticals and geographies ranging
from enterprises to SMBs and IT/ITeS, BFSI, manufacturing, govt, PSU, education,
telecom to many more segments.

Analysts estimate that on an average storage infrastructure is used to
between 40 and 60 percent capacity because of inflexible management functions.
Storage virtualization is at its most effective when the solution can be adopted
cross-platform: in physical, virtual and hybrid environments.

Storage demand is increasing as companies opt for virtual server platforms.
At the same time, the majority of virtual machines are not being backed up
today, suggesting the growth in storage management products for virtual
environments will continue.

At the desktop there is keen interest in the virtualization technologies, but
adoption is more cautious as endpoint management traditionally has not been the
domain of a single entity in the corporate IT support organization.

Said Anand Naik, Director, Systems Engineering, Symantec India. “We're seeing a high
adoption rate of some endpoint management functions such as applications
virtualization, but lower adoption in applications streaming. However, the
promise of more cost-effective licensing options, better mobility for users and
a more efficient management of the endpoint resources is driving strong adoption
of Symantec's endpoint virtualization and management solutions.”

Souma Das, AVP of Citrix, India feels that application virtualization has
seen better adoption amongst BFSI, telco, manufacturing and large enterprises.
He also points out that banking, finance, telco and ITeS companies are adopting
server virtualization and simultaneously are moving to application and desktop
virtualization.

Shailesh Agarwal, President-Business Systems, Systems and Technology Group,
IBM India/South Asia however feels that virtua­lization is not a segment value
proposition but instead is a size and complexity proposition. “It's a certain
size after which the complexity gets beyond a point that customers start seeing
the value proposition in virtualization. The infrastructure of banks, software
houses or ITeS companies is very conducive to it,” he added.

This is also because the x86 hardware was originally designed to run only a
single operating system and a single application. But with virtualization it is
possible to run multiple operating systems and multiple applications on the same
computer at the same time, increasing the utilization and flexibility of
hardware.

SMB say yes to virtualization

IT is now entering the next major transformation to cloud computing, which
potentially can deliver order-of-magnitude gains in IT flexibility, agility, and
cost-efficiency. This essentially means that they can pool their application
resources in both local data centers and remote compute clouds interchangeably,
fluidly, safely, and orchestrated with efficient precision.

With virtualization as their underlying architecture, companies are liberated
from physical resource constraints and can radically transform the economics of
IT. Virtualization is one of the building blocks for cloud computing and SMB
customers in India are increasingly turning to it.

Another reason for this mass movement in the SMB towards virtualization is
also the nature of challenges that this segment faces while managing their IT
infrastructure as well as while deciding on the purchase of new technology or
solution.

According to Symantec's Security and Storage SMB Survey 2009, it has been
revealed that SMBs in the country want to protect their information, both
internally and externally, but wafer thin budgets, inadequate and under trained
manpower are clearly stopping them from doing so.

“As information within SMBs continues to grow, there will be enormous
pressure on these organizations from their customers and partners to effectively
and appropriately, secure and manage their information. With this as the factors
it will be up to the SMB to see the benefits of virtualization technologies into
their environment as each area of the IT infrastructure can be virtualized
namely desktop, server, storage, network, etc. Intelligent Virtualization of key
resources will be the way ahead for SMB customers running on a tight IT budget,”
noted Naik.

This is a viewpoint that is unanimously shared by other industry peers. Das
noted that since SMB do not have too many in house resources to manage their
network they are turning towards the software as a service (SaaS) business
model. “They are looking at offering their ERP, CRM and financial solutions as a
service on a pay per use model. And virtualization will play a key role in
making this possible,” he added.

Recession boost

The adoption of virtualization got a shot in the arm during the recession.
This is because IT managers are under pressure to deliver more with less as
budgets for IT acquisition became tighter.

Aman Dokania, VP and GM-Infrastructure Software, HP Asia Pacific and Japan
noted that when an IT manager plans to purchase the next set of hardware, a
solution provider can suggest virtualization as it allows them to reduce their
hardware spend. “Customers can optimise their existing environment by going for
virtual machines so that they can deploy more applications without buying new
hardware.”

The other benefits for the SMB besides the capital cost saving is that in a
typical SMB environment there could be a couple of IT managers who manage the
entire system. Since virtualization is not a very complex technology their skill
sets can be easily raised and these managers can manage more applications as the
company begins to run more v machines. This means that there is no need for the
SMB to invest in more IT resources to manage more instances of compute
resources.

Opting in silos

One of the key attributes of virtualization is that it enables organizations
do more with less. This is why it is quickly finding its way to the top of the
list of strategic priorities for organizations which are focusing on cost
savings.

But while they are keen to realize the benefits of virtualization most
customers also have a very cautious approach towards it. Many begin their
virtualization efforts with server consolidation to immediately save money on
hardware expenses as well as on power, cooling, and facilities.

Post this, they extend virtualization to the desktop, storage and networking
areas, “to provide more flexible and economical approaches to business
continuity, security, and application service level agreements,” said Mahabala.

Agarwal pointed out that there is no rule that a customer needs to go for
storage virtualization before server or application virtualization or vice
versa. “Each of these layers are independent and a company can decide which one
it wants to virtualize first. But the important point is that they start at the
right time and know which layer will give it more impact to begin with to really
get the benefits of the technology,” he added.

A lot of vendors advocate to their users that they should not go for
virtualization of their complete environment on day one. Instead they could
start with the next server refresh project or the next application they are
going for and look at how virtualization will help them to drive down cost,
improve management and ensure high availability. This learning can then be
gradually scaled down across the other aspects of the holistic environment.

Keeping that in mind, it is easy to see why storage virtualization comes to
mind when one talks about the technology. It is however driven by server
virtualization because when the server is virtualized, there is a requirement to
have a SAN attached.

Mahabala noted that in India, many enterprises have already migrated to
storage area networking for a flexible, lower cost, higher service level storage
infrastructure. Currently, hundreds of enterprises are adopting server
virtualization technologies besides desktop virtualization that provide the same
benefits for the rest of the IT infrastructure.

Creating a business case

Since vendors are not involved in virtualization negotiations, especially in
the SMB space, are solution providers equipped to offer this business case
perspective to clients? Not really, according to Arunachalam S, Business
Head-Virtualization and Application Delivery, Frontier Business Systems. He felt
that most partners, especially the tier-2 SIs, consider virtualization as a
license sale and do not get into working out a business case for the customer.

There are assessment tools available which can be run into the environment
and collect data across several parameters, including power and workload
traffic. There are also RoI tools which can help SIs make a business case not
just to the CIO but the CFO as well.

“Though most of these online tools for assessing a customer's network and
offering the RoI in case the customer opts for virtualization are readily
available, few partners get into consultancy with the customer or talk to them
about direct and indirect benefits,” he added.

Keeping this in mind HP is working closely with its partners who have
solutions selling skill sets at scaling their business models to become more
competitive in bring solutions to customers rather than partners. On its part,
Citrix is appointing an additional 100 partners who will be trained and skilled
on virtualization, in addition to the 40 partners including tier-1 SI who are
trained.

According to IBM there are two roles that a solution provider has in
virtualization business-opportunity identification (OI) and opportunity
ownership (OO). Currently the company trains its partners in the former and over
a period of time, as their involvement in this business increases, they will be
skilled on how to own the customer.

Vinita Bhatia

vinitavs@cybermedia.co.in