Internap Plans Dual VMware-OpenStack Cloud Services
Internap plans to launch a dual-hypervisor compute cloud service giving customers the choice of a VMware-based stack or the open source OpenStack platform.
The move marks the company's first foray into the public cloud. Its current portfolio consists of colocation service, managed hosting (including dedicated private clouds) and a content delivery network (CDN).
Atlanta-based Internap offers a proprietary network backbone it calls Managed Internet Route Optimizer, or MIRO, which the company claims boosts network performance while reducing latency. The company also runs redundant carrier backbones throughout the world. Internap, which grossed $244 million in revenues last year, says it serves 2,700 enterprises worldwide.
As for its new offering, which will also use MIRO, customers can choose between a more costly cloud service with a VMware hypervisor or the less expensive OpenStack-based cloud service powered by Xen. The company said it is providing the ability to transition from the VMware stack to OpenStack.
"What we find when we talk to CIOs, almost all have done server consolidation and virtualization using VMware internally, so they are very comfortable with VMware, but they realize that open source hypervisors are likely the future just the way Linux sort of supplanted Solaris," explained Paul Carmody, Internap's senior vice president of business development and product management.
"They're interested in going with a partner that offers them a cloud that mimics what they've done internally with server consolidation, with the option to test out and eventually migrate into more of an open source hypervisor model, for better cost profiling," Carmody said.
Internap announced support for OpenStack in January, when it launched a public cloud storage service. The OpenStack-based service went into beta at the time and will be generally available by the end of June.
The cloud-based compute services will be generally available in the third quarter. Carmody said there will be a private beta with existing customers beforehand.
Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on May 09, 2011