IDEAS Insights

Citrix Gears Up to Compete as Major Virtualization Platform

Citrix Systems unveiled its lineup of virtualization products, which it hopes will position it as a major player in the burgeoning x86 virtualization market. The company announced that it has completed its $500 million dollar acquisition of XenSource, one of the leading developers of virtual machine technology based on the Xen hypervisor. The Citrix virtualization portfolio combines its existing products with the new technology that it acquired from XenSource, and contains three major components addressing different forms of virtualization:

• Citrix XenServer: a virtual machine platform based on the technology that was acquired from XenSource, suitable for mainstream virtualization activities such as consolidation and deploying virtual infrastructure;
• Citrix Presentation Server (formerly Citrix MetaFrame Server): an application virtualization platform that allows users to remotely access desktop applications, which are hosted on a single server operating system that provides users with a virtual desktop image;
• Citrix XenDesktop (due to ship in the first half of 2008): a desktop virtualization platform, which allows users to remotely access a complete virtual desktop environment in which virtual machines are used to host an entire instance of a desktop operating system.

With its new product lineup, Citrix will now compete head-on with VMware, the market leader for x86 virtualization.  As VMware proved in its early days, partnerships with major server OEMs are critical for virtualization platforms to get a foothold in large organizations, and indeed, Citrix is making progress lining up deals with hardware suppliers. Dell announced that it will offer the embedded Citrix XenServer OEM Edition across its PowerEdge server line, and it will offer the more full-function Citrix XenServer Enterprise Edition as a standalone product or as an upgrade from the XenServer OEM Edition. HP announced that it will qualify and sell Citrix XenServer Enterprise Edition on its ProLiant and BladeSystem servers.

In the short term, Citrix will be most competitive in meeting requirements for Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), whereby standard desktop operating systems are hosted in virtual machines on servers, which users interact with remotely by means of thin client devices. Interest in VDI has noticeably increased recently. Although the economic benefits of minimizing state on desktop clients first gained prominence more than 10 years ago with the emergence of the Network Computer concept, VDI is perceived to overcome many of the objections to earlier remote desktop solutions. The ability to run full-function, standard client operating systems like Windows maintains the fidelity of the end user experience, while allowing administrators to optimize the use of desktop computing resources and manage them with superior economies of scale. As Citrix competes with VMware for VDI opportunities, it hopes to benefit from its role as developer of the Independent Computing Architecture (ICA) protocol, which has long been used by thin and remote clients to communicate with Windows desktop environments hosted on servers. Citrix will couple its ICA protocol with XenSource’s virtual machine technology as part of Citrix XenDesktop, which it believes will strengthen its position as a leading enabler of VDI.

 

The XenSource acquisition also propels Citrix directly into the server virtualization market dominated by VMware. This market is somewhat of a new terrain for Citrix, where it will have to support a wide variety of server environments, including database, messaging, web servers, and line-of-business applications. These kinds of workloads are a significant departure from Citrix’s traditional focus on managing desktop sessions, which may require some adaptation in Citrix’s culture and support practices in order to effectively meet the demands of users depending on it for business-critical services. Still, server virtualization offers Citrix as a lucrative opportunity to break out of its traditional business, if VMware’s soaring revenues are any indication. VMware’s success has drawn a number of competitors promising to deliver alternative virtual machine platforms, including Microsoft, Novell, Red Hat, and Virtual Iron. VMware’s server virtualization platform currently benefits from a significant functional lead over other Xen-based competitors. However, as the functionality of alternative virtual machine platforms based on the open source Xen technology matures, a growing array of competitors will start to put pressure on VMware’s premiums. With its newfound muscle, Citrix could move to the head of that pack.

Is the Future of the Web 3D? Server Makers Have Reason to Hope It Will Be

While server virtualization is a great advantage for anyone who wants to make their systems run more efficiently, it presents a long term challenge to server and component manufacturers. While the take up of virtualization will boost sales as customers purchase new platforms to host technology, inevitably in the longer term the mathematics of server consolidation points to fewer units being sold. The challenge for the computer industry to avoid this shortfall is to find new applications to induce greater product demand.

I attended the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in Taiwan this week, and in a keynote presentation Intel Senior Fellow and Communications Technology Lab Director Kevin Kahn gave a clue about Intel's vision of a future application that will require increased workloads for servers, clients and the infrastructure in between. In his keynote Dr Kahn spoke passionately about the rise of the 3D Internet. His message was that virtual worlds like Second Life and World of Warcraft represent the beginnings of a 3D Internet experience that over time is bound to become more ubiquitous and will transform much of today's 2D web into a truly interactive, user driven experience presented in a fully rendered 3D virtual reality.

The virtual worlds of today, with Second Life as perhaps the most well known example, are certainly proving popular, with an estimated 60 million users worldwide in 2007, according to figures from Wired Magazine cited by Dr Kahn. In a short time they have become a platform not only for social interaction, but also for commerce and information dissemination. But in order for such a rich graphical environment to become standard on every desktop, an increased computational load will have to be borne by servers, desktops and networks alike. And it just so happens that Intel's processors, chipsets and other components can be found in the majority of products in these three categories.

In order for a rendered 3D experience to be ubiquitous, server, clients and networks alike will need to be able to do a lot more work than they do today. And they do a lot of work today. Also, universal broadband access will need to be vastly improved over today's standards in many parts of the world. Client PCs will all need to have the computational power necessary to do the 3D rendering, which is a resource intensive workload as any hard core gamer or graphic designer will tell you. This should also ensure that the personal computer stays with us for some time yet; thin client technology is not yet suited for 3D rendering across such a widely distributed network as the Internet.

Another key message from IDF was Intel's vision of mobile devices having the same internet experience as desktop PCs. If we are to combine this with Dr Kahn's 3D web, then the logical extension of this thinking is that future internet users will be engaged in a beautifully rendered 3D Internet on their mobile devices. That would be something to behold.

The web of today, apart from being a primarily text based medium, is still largely driven by server generated static content. Proponents of a transformed internet, including Dr Kahn, are calling for the balance to be shifted to more interaction and for much more user generated content. This paradigm, which has driven the Web 2.0 concept, will be integral to the next generation 3D web. Further to this, content providers will need to re-think how their services can most effectively be represented in a 3D virtual world. An online bookstore could let shoppers stroll amongst virtual shelves, or in a virtual auction room bidders' avatars could stare menacingly at each other. However, maybe not all Web content would be better delivered in this way. For example I would probably prefer to see my banking details in 2D text rather than try and converse with a virtual teller.

So is the concept of a 3D Internet inherently superior to that of a 2D one? While I think that a 3D virtual world would certainly be more immersive and engaging that today's experience, in my opinion many of the things we do online today would not necessarily be improved by being presented in 3D. But the laws of supply and demand dictate that if users want a 3D Internet, then someone will find a way of providing one. And that demand would be good news indeed for hardware manufacturers like Intel in the post-virtualization world.

Sun Gets it Right with Niagara 2 Servers

This past week Sun shipped the first servers based on its recently announced Niagara UltraSPARC T2 processor. The 1U Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and the 2U SPARC Enterprise T5220 meet the need of rack users, whereas the Sun Blade T6320 addresses the blade market. Although these are not general purpose servers, they do include some innovations and features that make them ideal for certain applications. Built-in virtualization, integrated on-chip cryptographic acceleration, eight floating-point units, and 10 Gigabit Ethernet integrated into the chip combine to make this generation of servers attractive for a wider range of markets than the past generation CoolThreads servers.

We applaud Sun for being the first to enter this emerging market for highly multithreaded servers. Although these servers are not general purpose servers, the current crop of Niagara 2 servers are good enough to address a number of market segments that could potentially be very large. Sun has seen great success with the first generation of Niagara, currently generating over $200 million per quarter and growing at 225% per year. With the new Niagara 2 servers, Sun should see this growth rate accelerate sharply as it moves into new markets. But how long can this growth be sustained? These servers could have had a significant impact on the market two years ago when Intel and AMD were producing dual-core processors. Now the market is producing quad-core processors with 8-cores on the drawing board. It’s just a matter of time before Intel and AMD enter the market with their own versions of Niagara. Sun cannot afford to sit on its laurels; it must continue to innovate to stay ahead of the competition.

The bottom line is these new Niagara 2 servers have the potential to dominate markets such as the Web-serving, streaming media, and any market where application parallelism is prevalent. With multiple threads and embedded cryptographic acceleration, these servers can not only serve Web pages, but they can efficiently process Web transactions as well. With high throughput, great performance per watt, and a good price, there is no reason not to buy these servers. Sun may also see some success in the HPC and entertainment markets due to the processors' greatly enhanced floating-point performance. These will certainly be great products for Sun. But the question is for how long? Will the Niagara 2 servers finally awaken the sleeping giant Intel just as AMD did with Opteron? Only time will tell.

IBM Moves Ahead with Industry-Standard Servers

Last week, IBM held its 2007 Analyst Conference in Stamford, CT. In the server space, there were no announcements, but IBM did reveal a number of interesting product details. One of the biggest surprises was the recent success of the new IBM BladeCenter QS21 blade, based on the Cell BE processor. The first generation Cell blade generated considerable excitement in the HPC market due to its exceptional floating-point performance, but it was difficult to program. The blazing performance is still there in the second generation, and IBM has finally found a way to take advantage of it. With the Cell BE blade, Big Blue claims it is gaining traction in the medical 3D image processing/rendering, Wall Street analytics, bioinformatics pattern matching, video/audio streaming, digital video surveillance pattern matching, and Digital Content Creation markets. Not only does this blade have the potential to revolutionize the HPC market, but it is ‘green’ as well. IBM reports that it can produce 1+ GFLOP per watt, making it up to four times more energy efficient than traditional x86 blades. Earlier in the year, IDEAS named the Cell BE blade one of our five finalists in the "Best of Blade Technologies." With the introduction of the QS21, we feel we made a wise selection.

IBM is well known for its staid executives in finely tailored suits painting a picture of IBM’s incredibly deep research and development, combined with highly skilled and experienced IBM sales executives. Alex Yost, IBM’s VP of BladeCenter, overlooked that IBM tradition when it came time to show off the new IBM BladeCenter S. Mr. Yost played the part of an IBM salesperson, while his co-marketer "Stuart" played the part of a Hewlett-Packard salesperson trying to sell HP’s BladeSystem c3000 nicknamed "Shorty." Alex would mention a capability of BladeCenter and Stuart would match it with a BladeSystem capability. The problem was Stuart often had to add additional components such as external storage arrays, tape autoloaders, network switches, a KVM, and power distribution units. In the end, the HP c3000 included a jumble of cables and devices on an adjacent ‘bread rack.’ If the visual was not enough, Stuart switched off the HP blade server and we were all greeted by dead silence, as Mr. Yost proudly proclaimed "Mine’s still running." Although out of character for IBM, this hard-hitting demonstration of BladeCenter vs. the competition is exactly what IBM needs to do. The blade market has degenerated into a fierce and dirty battle between HP and IBM, where those who do not hit the competition hard are doomed to come in a distant second. We anxiously await HP’s response to this attack and fully expect it to be just as surprising as IBM’s demo.

Finally, IBM took the time to explain its System x strategy, revealing some very interesting statistic in the process. Today, System x is the second largest server group in IBM (based on revenue) next to the System z, and by 2011 IBM expects it to be the largest server group. IBM has split its System x servers into three distinct categories. The first is a scale-out category featuring BladeCenter, the second category reflects scale-up with the expandable System x3950 M2, and the final is a high volume category that has the System x rack servers in it. Unlike some other vendors, IBM does not believe that blades are the answer for everything. Rather, customers get to choose based on their computing needs and system management preference. IDEAS feels this three-pronged strategy is a highly intelligent approach that will serve IBM well as the industry-standard server market transforms into a mature market.

Overall, IBM’s 2007 Analyst Conference was just what was needed to remind us that IBM is a serious contender in the industry-standard server and blade markets. Gone are the days when IBM could simply show up at the door and ask for the order. Like every other industry-standard server vendor, IBM must get down and dirty in the trenches to slog it out with Sun, HP, and Dell. From what we saw at the conference, IBM is more than ready to rise to the challenge. It has a well thought out System x product strategy, ongoing R&D, and an aggressive marketing staff. There are even a few surprises like the success of the new Cell BE blade. As IBM moves into the future, IDEAS expects it to be well positioned to provide a wide range of innovative industry-standard servers and solutions.

Virtualization, Management, Security, SMB, and Green Are Key Storage Strategies for IBM

IBM held its fall 2007 Systems and Technology Group (S&TG) IT Analysts Briefing on October 2d – 4th in Stamford, CT.  IBM’s S&TG covers technology for servers, storage, and software.  Analysts had the opportunity to hear and provide input on IBM’s strategy and roadmap pertaining to these areas. Here, we summarizes and discuss key points to IBM’s technology direction specifically for storage. Although the conference covered a wide range of individual storage topics, the underlying subject matter centered on virtualization, management, security, and SMB -- and the common theme throughout these subjects was the concept of green.

IBM reiterated that the major challenge facing enterprises today is the growing volume of data. In fact, the volume of data is expected to grow sixfold by 2010. Obviously, past and even current storage implementations will not meet the need of this growing demand. IBM’s strategy to meet this growth consists of four elements: enable business flexibility, mitigate risk, optimize IT, and leverage information. While noble in intention, these elements are extremely broad and require some underlying substance.

IBM’s plan for the enterprise involves many components, but virtualization, improved management, disaster recovery, and security are at the forefront. IBM will invest in increasing the robustness and reliability of its DS8000 storage platform, with emphasis on increased scalability, disk encryption, and advanced copy services such as FlashCopy, MetroMirror, and GlobalMirror. This emphasis on mirrored replication recognizes the importance of data protection, particularly for disaster recovery. Also key to IBM’s strategy for the enterprise is SAN Volume Controller (SVC).  Addressing data growth, data sharing, and efficient disk utilization will require a virtualized environment – and IBM makes no secret that SVC is the current storage virtualization market leader with close to 10,000 units installed. On the management front, enhancements to the Tivoli management framework will include a service focus with further emphasis on the alignment of technology with business needs. Tivoli continues to move away from its silo heritage to a more unified architecture that addresses servers, storage, and networks.

Key to the go ahead strategy for IBM is the SMB market. To address the SMB market for storage, IBM will focus on simplicity, pricing, packaging, and channel readiness. All enterprise storage vendors have recognized the opportunity for selling into the SMB market and IBM is no exception. But SMBs are sensitive to complexity and price.  SMBs do not have nearly the same level of resource as their enterprise counterparts and require products that are easier to install and support. Although sensitive to price, SMBs are not satisfied with enterprise products that are “dumbed down” to meet price points. They are seeking products that are targeted specifically to needs – and also affordable. The BladeCenter S is an example of such a product. IBM provided a very interesting demo of the BladeCenter S comparing it to HP’s BladeSystem c3000, nicknamed “shorty”. The demo was very entertaining and clearly displayed the advantages of BladeCenter S over the c3000. In fact, HP should take note and prepare a response. IBM is a bit later to the SMB market than other vendors and also has a long way to go in the channels area, but is otherwise well positioned to increase its market share in this space.
 
With all the discussion of enterprise, virtualization, and SMB, the one common thread was green.  However, IBM’s message was in the context of “storage for the green data center”, rather than “green storage.”  Although there was certainly some discussion of tools for power and cooling efficiencies, IBM’s main point was that following best business practices will ultimately translate to green. Technologies such as data classification, tiering (including tape), and de-duplication that result in positive effects for the business overall, now have a green significance to them. Organizing the data center for maximum efficiency businesswise is a good first step to the utmost in energy savings.