EMC VSPEX Available From Bull

Bull announced the availability of EMC VSPEX Proven Infrastructure solutions based on Bull’s bullion servers that provide validated solutions for virtual server environments – suitable for both business-critical application environments and for building private clouds – and will increase the number of VMs supported by current VSPEX configurations.

VSPEX delivers predictable performance that significantly reduces the planning, sizing and configuration burdens of adopting private cloud or end-user computing environments

Bull has capitalised on its expertise in EMC technologies and VMware-based server infrastructures, and through EMC’s VSPEX programme ensures the integration and alignment of hypervisor, compute, network, and storage components for a range of application workloads through a series of Reference Architectures, sizing and deployment guides.

Bull’s participation in EMC’s VSPEX programme is the latest step in a relationship that spans 20 years, extending across all major EMC product lines which are marketed throughout the world through Bull’s StoreWay storage integration arm.

At EMC World in Las Vegas, May 2012, Bull was named Best EMEA Partner for EMC’s Unified product line which includes VNX storage which underpins the VSPEX solutions. Bull was also named 2012 VMware EMEA Partner of the Year.

To date fourteen standard VSPEX Proven Infrastructures have been published by EMC for virtual server environments based on vSphere5 or Hyper-V, and VDI using VMware view or Citrix XenDesktop. Bull’s enterprise servers are compatible with all of these solutions.

Bull’s Storage and Virtualisation Competence center based in Grenoble, France has worked with EMC’s engineering teams in Hopkinton, MA to deliver the first of a series of new Reference Architectures that will increase the number of VMware VMs supported through the use of Bull’s bullion server technology.

bullion server range is ranked as the fastest X86 enterprise-class server currently available according to the international SPECint_rate2006 benchmark. Based on a modular architecture, and natively embedding the VMware ESXi virtualisation hypervisor, it enables IT departments to consolidate X86-based business applications while providing reliability and simplicity.

In any virtualisation or cloud deployment, the network plays a critical foundational role in the delivery and migration of data between VMs. Another unique feature of the new VSPEX solutions based on bullion is the integration of Brocade VDX6720 Data Center switches and VCSFabric technology. Brocade cloud-optimised networking technologies are designed to integrate and extend virtual compute in multi-vendor environments to help enable increased network performance, utilisation and resiliency in virtualised architectures. Using VCS fabrics, customers can manage dozens of switches as a single logical device, reducing operational costs.

The combination of bullion servers and VNX storage already has a proven track record in delivering customer value.

Amsterdam Trade Bank (ATB) is running business critical banking applications using bullion servers and VNX unified storage, with zero data loss HA assured through EMC VPLEX data replication spanning more than 30km.

The Spanish affiliate of Schmidt + Clemens Group, the German manufacturer of quality steel solutions, is using bullion servers and VNX storage as the basis of their new VDI virtual desktop environment.

"Delivering standardised converged server-storage infrastructures is a long-standing challenge to the industry, which has met with limited success until now due to the unique requirements of each user," notes Olivier Gaumont, director of Bull Enterprise Servers and Storage. "The large-scale adoption of virtual server environments and the availability of truly unified storage with EMC VNX now mean that VSPEX Proven Infrastructure can take up this challenge and for the first time deliver complete virtualisation solutions that combine the rigor of validated solution stacks without sacrificing the flexibility that our users demand."

"As businesses look to drive business efficiency and scale out virtualised data center environments, they are turning more and more to integrated, pre-validated multi-vendor solutions that offer the flexibility, simplicity and choice they desire," adds Barbara Spicek, senior director – Partner Sales EMEA at Brocade. "By integrating innovative solutions from Brocade, Bull and EMC, this VSPEX configuration is ideally placed to help larger enterprises build infrastructures for the future."

Philippe Fossé, EMC’s VP of EMEA Channels, states: "EMC VSPEX is the industry’s most simple, efficient, and flexible Proven Infrastructures that help customers deploy their cloud faster. By combining the strengths of EMC storage and next generation backup technologies and Bull ‘s bullion servers, we are together extending the reach of VSPEX into new mission-critical and private cloud environments."

Currently Bull employs around 9,000 people across more than 50 countries, with over 700 staff totally focused on R&D. In 2011, Bull recorded revenues of €1.3 billion.