Public Beta Version of VMware Stage Manager

VMware, Inc. announced the public beta of VMware
Stage Manager, a new first-in-class management and automation product that
streamlines and accelerates the process of bringing new or modified
applications and other IT services into production. Building on the management
capabilities of VMware Infrastructure, VMware Stage Manager automates
management of complete, multi-tier application environments — including the
servers, storage and networking systems that support them — as they move
through various stages from integration to testing to staging and user
acceptance before being released into production.

"VMware has once again responded to the needs of customers ahead of the
curve and has delivered a rock-solid beta," said Dave Welch, principal for
House of Brick Technologies, a consultancy that serves blue chip companies.
"They’ve thought of just about everything, but kept the interface simple.
VMware Stage Manager enables IT to transition applications cleanly through to
production. VMware Stage Manager also helps administrators move out of rote
operations and keep them focused on ROI-generating projects."

As new services or changes to existing IT services are being introduced —
for example, rolling out an upgrade to Exchange 2008 or making changes to a
complex SAP installation — they often follow a sequence of stages to ensure
they are successfully tested, approved and configured for deployment into
production. IT typically maintains numerous dedicated "shadow instances" of
the production environment to enable each of these stages. These systems are
prone to "drift" out of synch with the production configuration, jeopardizing
the successful execution of system changes and updates and increasing the risk
of production downtime.

VMware Stage Manager helps IT address these and other "service transition"
challenges with the ability to visualize, organize and streamline resources
and processes across the service release lifecycle. By deploying VMware Stage
Manager, IT administrators and application owners can:

• Manage pre-production infrastructure assets — servers, storage and networking equipment — utilizing them only when needed, thereby reducing server sprawl and increasing the resource utilization efficiency of IT services hosted on VMware Infrastructure
• Rapidly build up a pre-production image of complex production environments, even cloning directly from production systems to ensure that all environments are exact replicas, thereby mitigating risk of errors and potential downtime
• Systematically propagate complex system changes through all phases of the process while more easily enforcing change and release management procedures
• Accelerate the completion of requests for changes to production systems

"VMware virtualization is the standard for a new and better architecture
for running applications," said Dan Chu, vice president of emerging products
and markets at VMware. "VMware Stage Manager adds to the power of the VMware
platform by automating and streamlining the staging process for deploying new
applications and updates."

"Enterprise IT teams face multiple resource and process challenges that
introduce risk and slow down the deployment of new services into production,"
said Stephen Elliot, research director for IDC. "Virtualization offers IT
organizations an opportunity to streamline inefficient processes and
communicate business process impact across multiple functional areas."

VMware, Inc.