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Hyper-convergence knocks down silos

Admire Moyo
By Admire Moyo, ITWeb's news editor.
Johannesburg, 02 Jul 2015
Hyper-convergence is an extension of a converged infrastructure, says F5 Networks.
Hyper-convergence is an extension of a converged infrastructure, says F5 Networks.

Hyper-converged infrastructures are knocking down the silos that still inhibit legacy IT, where networking, servers and storage are all operated independently.

So says Gary Newe, director for field systems engineering for the UK, Ireland and sub-Sahara Africa at F5 Networks.

He notes hyper-convergence is an extension of a converged infrastructure, where compute, server, storage, networking resources and software are pooled together on commodity hardware. They are usually systems from separate companies but designed to work well together, he explains.

According to IDC, sales of hyper-converged systems are expected to increase 116.2% in 2015 over the previous year to $806.8 million. The market is expected to experience a 59.7% compound annual growth rate from 2014 to 2019, when it will generate more than $3.9 billion in total sales, it adds.

Francois Smith, enterprise and field marketing manager at Dell SA, says more and more enterprises are turning to hyper-converged solutions as a method to simplify and streamline IT capabilities while delivering both rapid time-to-value and business results.

Paul Ruinaard, regional sales manager for sub-Saharan Africa at Nutanix, concurs, saying by using hyper-converged architecture, many of the challenges organisations face in regard to storage go away.

Newe notes the benefits of hyper-converged architecture include simplified IT management, which makes things faster, more agile and more efficient.

"It's one of the foundations of virtualisation, but hyper-convergence allows for even greater abstraction of software and hardware, more centralised management and a greater emphasis on virtualisation capabilities."

This is a modular system that is designed to scale out; instead of adding new storage, for example, a new module is added, giving the whole system a boost, Newe explains.

"It also offers support for additional features including wide area network optimisation, software-defined networking technology and data deduplication. The advantages of a hyper-converged infrastructure are that it allows all elements to be managed from a single point - this is the perfect way to simplify the virtualised environment," he concludes.

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