Nimble Storage Reveals SmartStack Solution, Provided by Avnet

Nimble Storage, Inc. announced a converged infrastructure solution that allows enterprises to address the storage performance challenges for desktop and server virtualization workloads in a single converged infrastructure stack.

With this new solution, enterprises are no longer burdened with maintaining separately managed infrastructure to cost-effectively meet performance demands. To assist channel partners, Avnet Technology Solutions, the global IT solutions distribution company and an operating group of Avnet, Inc., will offer pre-integration services for Nimble Storage SmartStack (registration needed) converged infrastructure solutions, providing faster time to deployment.
 
Due to the differing characteristics and performance requirements of business critical applications and VDI, enterprises with multi-workload environments are forced to create and manage infrastructures in silos. To alleviate this administrative nightmare, enterprises require a single architecture that adapts to both the performance and data protection requirements of each workload. The new SmartStack for Desktop and Server Virtualization delivers the performance required for VDI and server virtualization, while at the same time providing reliability and data protection through the snapshot and replication features built into Nimble’s Cache Accelerated Sequential Layout (CASL) architecture.
 
In addition to meeting the demands of diverse workloads with a single storage architecture, enterprises are able to accelerate deployment while minimizing the risks associated with deploying solutions with a pre-validated reference architecture based on Cisco Unified Computing System with vSphere, VMware Horizon View and Nimble Storage.

By leveraging Cisco blade architecture and VMware’s desktop and server virtualization platforms, enterprises now have the flexibility to scale their environment as their business grows. For scaling as organizations grow, IT administrators can replicate the 500-user building block.
 
Resellers Provide Faster Time to Deployment
with Avnet Technology Solutions Pre-Integration Services
Whether deploying solutions for desktop virtualization, server virtualization, or both, Nimble Storage channel partners can offer SmartStack converged infrastructure solutions as an integrated solution through North American distributor Avnet Technology Solutions. Avnet has availability slated for mid-March 2014. As a result, resellers can be confident in deploying solutions for their customers that have been pre-integrated by Avnet Technology Solutions, and pre-validated by VMware, Cisco and Nimble Storage.
 
As a part of this service resellers can depend on Nimble Storage as the point of entry for SmartStack Integration Support. Resellers are now able to ensure customers experience a faster time to deployment, quality integration and a single point for support.
 
“Besides greater performance and simplified management, the Nimble Storage array provides the flexibility and scalability that guarantees us continued success. When combined with our Cisco UCS platform, vSphere, and VMware Horizon View, we now have a complete top-to-bottom infrastructure that provides the agility to conform to the needs of the business. Because storage constraints are no longer our major area of risk, we can deploy our upcoming VDI project on the same array as our virtualized applications, eliminating the need to deploy and manage another storage silo,” said Jeremy Stephens, executive director of information technology, The Santa Claran Hotel Casino.
 
“Virtualized applications and VDI environments are workloads with differing characteristics. Customers continue to seek simplified approaches for deployment and management of these workloads in their infrastructures. Nimble Storage with VMware Horizon View can provide a foundation for storage planning and architectural design, with the flexibility to scale as these diverse workloads grow,” said Mason Uyeda, senior director of technical marketing, end-user computing, VMware, Inc.

“Our ability to provide configuration services and testing validation for SmartStack solutions is an expansion of our support for the Nimble channel ecosystem, which has already simplified the procurement process for resellers. Leveraging our pre-integration services enables channel partners to gain a competitive edge by strengthening their offerings and speeding time to a complete solution deployment, while minimizing costs and investment risk,” said Scott Look, VP and GM, connected and secured solutions, Avnet Technology Solutions, Americas.
 
“Increasingly, our customers are expressing the challenges associated with managing multi-workload infrastructures. To eliminate the administrative burden of managing separate infrastructure silos, Nimble provides storage arrays that adapt to serve these diverse workloads in a single system, and now also provides a reference architecture to accelerate the deployment of a unified desktop and server virtualization solution with Cisco and VMware,” said Radhika Krishnan, VP of product marketing and alliances, Nimble Storage.