Dell-bashing is a fairly common pastime these days, but I actually think Dell has a golden opportunity to reposition itself as IT visionary if it treats hardware it as what it really is: a delivery mechanism for software and services. Read more »
Hadoop-based startup Platfora has raised $5.7 million from Andreessen Horowitz and military intelligence–focused strategic investor In-Q-Tel. Investors are excited because Platfora promises big things around making big data analytics obtainable by anyone needing to parse large volumes of unstructured data, not just data scientists. Read more »
Cotendo is leveraging Equinix’s global data center footprint to give itself 30 points of presence, letting Cotendo focus on differentiating elsewhere. The companies released details of their partnership Thursday morning, including a quadrupling of Cotendo’s customer base to 400 from 100 in the past two years. Read more »
Google App Engine is growing up by changing both its service model and its pricing, and many developers who have been using the service under the old model are none too happy about it. Perhaps they should just be happy that App Engine is sticking around. Read more »
On Wednesday HP released its first two public cloud computing services for private beta, based in part on the open-source OpenStack code. The services, some details of which were leaked in the spring, are HP Cloud Compute and HP Cloud Object Storage. Read more »
Cloud computing and big data are a match made in heaven. Although it’s still very early in the evolution of this combination — experts predict major investment in this area going forward — several companies have already melded the two into a variety of unique services. Read more »
Mashape, an API marketplace catering to both application developers and providers, has raised a $1.5 million seed round from a who’s who of technology investors, including Index Ventures, Charles River Ventures, Ignition Partners, Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos and Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavors. Read more »
VMworld can be a lot to digest, but it also can be a good barometer of where IT is and where it’s going. A couple days removed from the show, I gave some thought to the interesting trends I noticed and the insightful discussions I had. Read more »
CloudSpokes, an Appirio-led community that hosts contests in which developers compete on projects for cloud companies with the goal of winning a monetary prize, recently re-architected the site from Microsoft Windows Azure to Database.com, and its team couldn’t be happier with the results. Read more »
During VMworld this week, VMware introduced a new Dropbox-like application called Project Octopus that will let users safely store, access and share corporate documents. It all so sounded so promising, and then someone asked me whether it will actually get used. Read more »
In the world of Software as a Service, integration is critical. It gets small SaaS providers in front of new potential customers already predisposed to buying cloud-based services, and it gives individual SaaS vendors a fighting chance against large software vendors with lots of products and salespeople. Read more »
VMware this morning announced VXLAN, the company’s attempt to allow virtual machines to span geographical data centers as part of the same LAN. Herrod said it will create “software-based networks that can be created on-demand, enabling enterprises to leverage capacity wherever it’s available.” Read more »
It was an eventful first day at VMworld, highlighted by Paul Maritz’s keynote to thousands of attendees and Fusion-io’s superhero-themed party featuring Marvel Comics creator Stan Lee and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. Here’s VMworld Day 1 as I experienced it outside the press room. Read more »
MapR Technologies, the San Jose, Calif.-based startup that sells it own Hadoop distribution for analyzing large volumes of unstructured data, has raised a $20 million Series B round, which will helps its positioning as a worthy alternative in a space that Cloudera has dominated since 2009. Read more »
Speaking to a jam-packed room of thousands, VMware CEO Paul Maritz kicked off today’s VMworld conference by declaring, once again, the advent of the cloud era. If you don’t believe him, just look at the number of virtual machines deployed. But cloud is more than virtualization. Read more »
Dell has officially become a cloud provider with the launch of an Infrastructure-as-a-Service cloud built atop VMware technology. The move is just the first in Dell’s three-pronged IaaS attack, which will soon include clouds based on the Microsoft Windows Azure and OpenStack platforms. Read more »
Heroku, the popular Platform-as-a-Service offering initially for Ruby developers only, now supports Java. Actually, Heroku has added support for both the Node.js framework and the Clojure programming language over the past few months, but Java is in a whole other league. Read more »
Verizon is buying cloud computing startup CloudSwitch in a move that will give Verizon, as well as its subsidiary Terremark, a software-development edge to complement its service-provider expertise. CloudSwitch will lead software development beyond its core product, which will give Verizon additional cloud intellectual property. Read more »
VMware has added support for the PHP and Python programming languages to Cloud Foundry, it open source Platform as a Service. Such news isn’t necessarily groundbreaking considering the project’s focus on multi-language support, but how it added PHP, at least, is very noteworthy. Read more »
Eucalyptus Systems released the third generation of its pioneering private cloud computing software on Wednesday, complete with high-availability capabilities to ensure maximum uptime. Rumors of Eucalyptus’s demise have been circulating since OpenStack launched its open-source cloud project last summer, but the company isn’t slowing down. Read more »
VMware has released Micro Cloud Foundry, a fully functional version of its open-source, Platform-as-a-Service software condensed into a virtual image that runs on developers’ personal computers or laptops. The aim is to make it easier to create cutting-edge applications without the hassle. Read more »
Google, which serves about 7 percent of the world’s overall web traffic, isn’t any ordinary company. Google Research Director Peter Norvig recently shared some of the considerations that Google takes into account when designing its infrastructure and systems to operate at Internet scale. Read more »
Platform-as-a-Service veteran Engine Yard is getting on board with the recent trend of multi-language support by acquiring Dublin, Ireland-based PHP PaaS startup Orchestra. An industry shift toward supporting more than one language and/or framework likely influenced the decision to close the Orchestra deal now. Read more »
Hopper wants to make searching for travel options a more complete experience using big data tools, and it has raised millions to do it. Hopper lets users enter keyword searches, but it provides results far beyond those typically found in a keyword search. Read more »
If HP does sell off its PC business, it might have to nail its foray into cloud computing to avoid becoming a punchline decades down the road. Without that PC revenue, and billions lighter in the wallet after buying Autonomy, something must pick up the slack. Read more »
The latest idea from Facebook on how to revolutionize the data center is elegant in its simplicity: put a switch on hard-disk drives that slows their speed when their data is no longer hot. I wonder if Facebook will take up the cause and build it. Read more »
Angry Birds creator Rovio is using predictive analytics software from Seattle-based startup Medio in an attempt to improve the gaming experience and keep users playing. Mobile and social games might appear to be cute diversions, but they’re generating lots of money. Read more »
In late June, Accenture CTO Don Rippert left the company after nearly 30 years to serve as CEO of NoSQL database startup Basho. Why would someone leave a top role at a Fortune 500 company for a 40-person startup in a niche market? Read more »
Software-as-a-Service startup GoodData has raised a $15 million Series B funding round for its cloud-based business intelligence product. Andreessen Horowitz led the round, along with other existing investors General Catalyst Partners, Fidelity Growth Partners and Windcrest Partners. GoodData has now raised $28.5 million overall. Read more »
When Congress returns from its summer recess in early September, it will vote on patent reform legislation that should represent a major overhaul of the United States patent system. It won’t do away with patent trolls or software patents, but it could level the playing field. Read more »
Dell’s Crowbar installation-and-configuration tool now works VMware’s Cloud Foundry. With servers fast becoming low-margin commodities thanks to the push toward micro servers, Dell is doing its best to make deploying the software that inspired the new generation of servers a breeze. Read more »
Amazon Web Services has rolled out a new region, called GovCloud, designed specifically for federal government workloads. The region is designed to meet the myriad regulations that government agencies must meet when deploying new infrastructure, which have proven a hindrance in terms government cloud adoption. Read more »
Nutanix is counting on mid-size enterprises to drive its adoption of its converged infrastructure appliance. CEO Dheeraj Pandey’s stance is that SMEs have the budgets, the IT demands and the right cultures to justify taking chances on new approaches to infrastructure. He could be onto something. Read more »
OpenLogic, a software vendor that helps companies better utilize open-source software, is turning its attention toward cloud computing. On Tuesday, it announced $2 million in funding for a new Platform-as-a-Service offering featuring open-source components. Read more »
Last week’s outages at Microsoft and Amazon Web Services reiterated a very important lesson in cloud computing: Even the best-laid plans won’t stand up to an act of god or faulty electrical infrastructure. That’s why the burgeoning field of cloud insurance looks even better than ever. Read more »
Zerto, an Israel-based startup focused on providing disaster recovery for virtualized and cloud resources, has closed a $15 million Series B funding round from U.S. Venture Partners, Battery Ventures and Greylock Partners. The company launched in June and has now raised $21 million overall. Read more »
Todd Papaioannou, VP and chief cloud architect at Yahoo, has left the company for a role as entrepreneur in residence at Battery Ventures. At Yahoo, he drove the strategic directions for both the cloud computing and Hadoop teams and helped define the company’s overall IT strategy. Read more »
It looks like Zynga’s infrastructure strategy is rubbing off on gaming startups. Digital Chocolate, purveyor of social games such as Millionaire City and Pro MMA Fighter, is following in Zynga’s footsteps of launching games in the cloud, then bringing them back in house when demand levels. Read more »
The great things about open source software stacks is that they’re free and they work. The not-so-great thing is that — like many open source projects — they can be difficult to configure and manage. Luckily, hardware vendors are stepping in to fill the void. Read more »
Amazon Web Services announced a trio of features designed to lure in enterprise users, including dedicated 1- or 10-Gigabit links to its cloud data centers. AWS is doing everything it can to make its services as flexible, reliable and secure as possible for enterprise users. Read more »
