A Look At Startup Opportunities In The Container Era

The DockerCon user conference recently concluded in San Francisco, and the evidence of the container movement gaining momentum was clear — 2,000+ attendees, 70 sponsors and more than 40 exhibitors.

Add to this the approximately $500 million of VC investment in container-related companies to date; the lists of hot startups that are beginning to appear; the anointing of new paradigms by respected investors; and the user surveys with record-breaking buying-intention scores and there is no doubt that the container wave has propelled the DevOps engineer as a new power buyer in the enterprise.

I expect that the impact of containers will be similar to that of virtualization’s impact on the data center.

The key difference between virtualization and containers is well described by Mitchell Hashimoto, DevOps guru and founder of the data center automation and management company HashiCorp: “Whereas virtualization is like the sci-fi concept of terraforming a planet, embracing containers is more akin to building many isolated biodomes on a single planet.”

Here are some of the opportunities in the container ecosystem:Virtualization created one platform company in VMware, and it looks like Docker’s visionary approach has been rewarded with a first-mover advantage. However, just as how a host of other independent players who provided adjacent services were created in the virtualization era, I see greenfield potential for entrepreneurs founding container-related companies today.

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eBook: Storage Virtualization for Dummies

Understand storage virtualization and how it can transform your data center in this easy to read eBook. Virtualization is undoubtedly revolutionizing the storage environment, just as it has done for servers. Hitachi Data Systems Storage Virtualization for Dummies sheds new light on storage virtualization technologies while dispelling common myths. In this book, you’ll learn how to select, architect and deploy today’s most powerful storage technologies, while drastically reduce storage costs. Stop wasting valuable storage resources and learn more about making the transition to virtualized storage.

Download this 74 pages eBook

Voke Research: Market Snapshot Report - Service Virtualization

This report reveals the findings of an in-depth survey of 192 Software Development Leaders from all industries of enterprise and the major challenges and business impact of their Software Development, Testing and Deployment constraints.

More specifically the research highlights:

The 8 market forces intensifying the challenge every day

The 5 major reasons that cause software delays

The key IT and business benefits of eliminating constraints

How to assess Service Virtualization technology and build a Business Case

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Top 10 Reasons to Strengthen Information Security with Desktop Virtualization

The tension between security and business productivity has never been so acute. To operate at peak performance and competitiveness, organizations need workers to access enterprise resources in more places and in more ways than ever before—but the resulting proliferation of work locations, types of workers and access methods has pushed traditional security strategies to the breaking point. The consumerization of IT adds further complexity as a diverse mix of laptops, smartphones and tablets enter the environment, including both enterprise-owned devices and those purchased by workers.

While technologies such as firewalls, anti-virus, access control and perimeter monitoring remain an important base, they’re increasingly bypassed, as today’s skilled attackers directly target applications and data. What’s needed is a new security layer—one that makes it possible to manage risk more effectively.

According to Forrester Research Inc. “Proper management and control of user accounts, access permissions, and privileges is one of the most effective avenues to ensuring that data doesn’t walk out the door.” (“Twelve Recommendations For Your 2011 Security Strategy”, Forrester Research Inc. December 2010). Desktop virtualization provides that additional security layer, allowing full freedom for organizations to embrace workshifting and deploy personnel and resources wherever and whenever they’re needed, while fortifying information security and compliance in support of business and IT priorities.

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Virtualization and Cloud Computing: Optimized Power, Cooling, and Management Maximizes Benefits

IT virtualization, the engine behind cloud computing, can have significant consequences on the data center physical infrastructure (DCPI). Higher power densities that often result can challenge the cooling capabilities of an existing system. Reduced overall energy consumption that typically results from physical server consolidation may actually worsen the data center’s power usage effectiveness (PUE). Dynamic loads that vary in time and location may heighten the risk of downtime if rack-level power and cooling health are not understood and considered. Finally, the fault-tolerant nature of a highly virtualized environment could raise questions about the level of redundancy required in the physical infrastructure. These particular effects of virtualization are discussed and possible solutions or methods for dealing with them are offered.

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Video Info-graphics: Stuxnet: Anatomy of a Computer Virus

Stuxnet: Anatomy of a Computer Virus does a fantastic job of telling a story. The narration and the visuals work well together to give context and presence to a very abstract and formless topic.

Watch this 3min 20sec video info-graphics.

eBook: Storage Virtualization for Dummies

Understand storage virtualization and how it can transform your data center in this easy to read eBook. Virtualization is undoubtedly revolutionizing the storage environment, just as it has done for servers. Hitachi Data Systems Storage Virtualization for Dummies sheds new light on storage virtualization technologies while dispelling common myths. In this book, you’ll learn how to select, architect and deploy today’s most powerful storage technologies, while drastically reduce storage costs. Stop wasting valuable storage resources and learn more about making the transition to virtualized storage. Download this 74 pages eBook

Avoiding the Hazards of IT Consolidation

In an effort to reduce costs and streamline operations, today's large, distributed organizations are investing more in data center transformation, consolidation, and server virtualization. And yet many IT consolidation projects suffer from poor planning and implementation issues that ultimately impact application performance and user productivity. This technology brief investigates the processes and tools that are needed to provide complete enterprise visibility and WAN acceleration for high-priority traffic.