The launch of Cisco’s UCS also paves the way for the vendor to introduce the Advanced Technology partner specialisation, which will be focused on helping partners in the Middle East region to develop expertise in unified computing and data centre technologies.
By unveiling UCS, Cisco is delivering on the promise of virtualisation through Unified Computing — an architecture that bridges the silos in the data centre into one unified architecture using industry standard technologies.
Key to Cisco’s approach is UCS, which unites compute, network, storage access, and virtualisation resources in a single energy efficient system that can reduce IT infrastructure costs and complexity, help extend capital assets and improve business agility well into the future.
The launch extends Cisco’s data centre portfolio and are a critical step in the company’s Date Centre 3.0 strategy. To help customers accelerate the transition to the unified computing architecture, Cisco is paving the way with a comprehensive suite of new unified computing services.
Scott Rose, Senior Director, Product Management, Server, Access & Virtualisation Business Unit at Cisco, says the virtual machine has become the new atomic building block of the data centre, creating new challenges and opportunities with the potential to transform the computing environment and deliver significant benefits “Taking advantage of this architectural shift in the data centre, we developed a unique new computing model that transforms the data centre into a dynamic IT environment with the power to increase productivity, improve business agility and drive the benefits of virtualisation to an entirely new level. It gives me great pleasure to introduce it to the Middle East here today.”
Rose adds that UCS is a new computing model that uses integrated management and combines a “wire once” unified fabric with an industry standard computing platform to optimise virtualisation, reduce data centre total overall cost, and provide dynamic resource provisioning for increased business agility.
Angus Mac-Comick, Director, Datacentre, Virtualisation and Unified Computing: Emerging Markets at Cisco says in the last 10 months that UCS has been in the market, the company has concentrated on recruiting partners in the region who will take UCS solutions and its comprehensive suite of services to market. “At the moment we are providing unified computing services through Cisco Services,” he says. “We are in the process of developing our partners in the region to focus in this area as well.”
Mac-Comick says partner training and certification for the new specialisation will be a key focus for Cisco this year.
Cisco has unveiled its Unified Computing System (UCS), a new data centre architecture, innovative services and an open ecosystem of best in class partners to help its customers in the UAE develop next-generation data centres that unleash the full power of virtualisation.
