Dell Technologies World: VMware Cloud on Dell EMC

VMware, Inc. introduced VMware Cloud on Dell EMC, which will provide simple, more secure and scalable infrastructure delivered as-a-service to customers’ on-premises data center and edge locations.

Featuring the company’s performance compute, storage and networking software powered by vSphere, vSAN and NSX running on Dell EMC, part of Dell Technologies, VxRail hyperconverged infrastructure, the service will be managed by VMware, enabling customers to focus on business innovation and differentiation. VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will be core to the Dell Technologies Cloud Data Center-as-a-Service solution unveiled at Dell Technologies World 2019.

Modern enterprises rely on hybrid cloud to help accelerate the delivery of innovative services to the business and to ultimately deliver new customer experiences. The company is investing in solutions that address multi-cloud environments as well as advancing hybrid cloud operations from the data center to the cloud to the edge. VMware Cloud on Dell EMC – a cloud service – will combine public cloud simplicity, agility and economics with the security, control and performance of on-premises infrastructure. This approach will simplify the customer experience enabling them to quickly consume the service with agility and efficiency.

“Whether they’re running infrastructure on-premises or in the cloud, organizations value a cloud operating model,” said Mark Lohmeyer, SVP and GM, cloud platform business unit, VMware. “VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will deliver that cloud experience to organizations that need to maintain data and applications on-premises-completely transforming how they acquire, deploy and manage infrastructure. The service will provide consistent infrastructure and operations across cloud, data center and edge, freeing organizations to drive innovation and deliver business value while VMware operates the entire infrastructure end-to-end.”

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Delivering simple, more secure and scalable infrastructure to data center and edge
Co-engineered and delivered by Dell Technologies, Inc., VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will consist of the firm’s compute, storage and networking infrastructure software integrated with VxRail hyperconverged infrastructure delivered as a service.

Built on VMware Project Dimension technology unveiled at VMworld 2018 US, VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will enable organizations to consume infrastructure in data center and edge environments on-demand like a public cloud service via a hybrid cloud control plane. The control plane will provide administrators with visibility and management of all on-premises systems including monitoring the health of their racks, tracking the steps the company’s engineers take to resolve service issues, and automatic patching and upgrading of systems end-to-end. The subscription-based service will offer cloud-like flexible consumption and payment options.

Service will enable organizations to achieve following benefits:

Reduced operational complexity: VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will simplify the end-to-end management of data center and edge infrastructure. The service will include: one-click hardware ordering, initial deployment, automated patching and upgrades of software and hardware, monitoring and remediation as well as providing a global view of infrastructure across all on-premises locations.

Consistent operations and infrastructure across cloud, data center and edge: Offering infrastructure – compute, storage and networking delivered as-a-service-and consistent operations – integrated and unified cloud management – it will provide organizations with high level of flexibility for where workloads are deployed while extending proven models and established skills for operations, governance and security. Organizations will be able to address: data center and edge location modernization; data latency and sovereignty sensitive workloads; and extend and modernize existing applications by supporting containers and Kubernetes. The service will also link to cloud services offered by cloud providers, while maintaining applications on VMware infrastructure. Organizations will own and be responsible for their data-which always stays on-premises at data center or edge locations.
Accelerated innovation: With VMware operating the entire infrastructure, IT organizations will be able to focus on delivering higher level value to the business such as refreshing infrastructure in data center and edge locations in support of traditional and modern applications. The service will further enable IT to offer developers increased freedom to build modern applications that drive the business forward without jeopardizing the operational integrity of those applications or introducing complexity in how those applications are supported.
Built-in enterprise security across the data center and edge locations: Security will be intrinsic to VMware Cloud on Dell EMC with the micro-segmentation capabilities of NSX providing enhanced security for traditional or modern applications while encryption capabilities will better secure data at-rest as well as data in-transit.

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VMware Cloud on Dell EMC and VMware Cloud Foundation both harness the power of the VMware Software Defined Data Center, widely deployed cloud infrastructures supporting some of the demanding business critical applications across global data centers. VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will pioneer a new model for IT that delivers the company’s SDDC stack on-premises as-a-service that is managed and updated by the firm. VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail offers a jointly engineered, hybrid cloud infrastructure stack integrated with VMware’s flexible, full stack HCI architecture for a simple and quick path to deploy hybrid cloud. It is delivered as an on-premises solution managed by the customer.

“VMware Cloud on Dell EMC will allow us to do more with less. We have multiple locations where we have large data requirements but few personnel resources, which would make it ideal for the cloud. Given the large data requirements, the bandwidth it would require makes it cost prohibitive. This is where VMware Cloud on Dell EMC comes into play. It allows us to treat the compute and storage as cloud resources without the added bandwidth expense. Currently we use an OpEx purchasing model for all of our local compute and storage resources. By utilizing VMware Cloud on Dell EMC we will be able to continue this model while allowing VMware and Dell EMC to manage the end-to-end equipment life cycle for us. This frees up our limited resources to do more value added work for our business units,” said Todd Pugh, CIO, SugarCreek.

“As businesses accelerate their use of innovative services across the organization, their IT teams must be able to quickly deploy and continuously update resources across shared datacenters as well as a growing range of dedicated cloud platforms in corporate datacenters and critical edge locations. With the introduction of VMware Cloud on Dell EMC, VMware is entering the fast emerging industry for on-premises infrastructure delivered as-a-service. It’s enabling CIOs and their IT teams to more effectively take advantage of new technologies and deployment models that allow for the optimal placement workloads while enabling easy access to the latest infrastructure and a consistent operational approach across all environments,” said Richard Villars, research VP, datacenter and cloud, IDC.

“Dell EMC and VMware have been working together diligently to make this an excellent service for customers, who are looking to streamline their operations, reduce operational complexity and accelerate innovation. With VMware Cloud on Dell EMC, VMware’s infrastructure software is integrated with the Dell EMC VxRail hyperconverged platform, offering the fastest and simplest way to hybrid clouds and empowering customers to drive any enterprise workload. It’s a win-win for IT and line of business owners,” said Matt Baker, SVP, strategy and planning, Dell EMC

VMware Cloud on Dell EMC is currently in beta.
The offering is expected to become available in the U.S. in 2H19.

Resources:
Blog: Announcing VMware Cloud on Dell EMC
Q&A with VMware Cloud Platform BU CTO Kit Colbert on How the Cloud is Redefining How We Run Data Centers
VMware Cloud on Dell EMC