HPE To Cisco, Lenovo, Huawei: When It Comes To SimpliVity, You Are On Your Own

#HewlettPackardEnterprise is putting former vendor sales partners of #SimpliVity on notice that their time as a partner of the #hyperconvergedinfrastructure is fast coming to a close. With the closing this month of #HPE ’s $650 million acquisition of SimpliVity, Antonio Neri, vice president and general manager of the company’s Enterprise Group, said that means former sales partners of SimpliVity – #Cisco Systems, #Lenovo and #Huawei -- will have to find their own way to hyper-converged infrastructure success.  SimpliVity did not sell its hyper-converged infrastructure technologies, which include its #OmniStack software and a proprietary card that sits in qualified servers, through Cisco, Lenovo or Huawei. Instead, it offered the technology as a so-called meet-in-the-channel model where solution providers integrated the SimpliVity technology with the server of choice for the customer.

http://m.crn.com/news/data-center/300083952/hpe-to-cisco-lenovo-huawei-when-it-comes-to-simplivity-you-are-on-your-own.htm?itc=hp_todays_news

SimpliVity CEO Kempel On Huawei Deal, Courting HPE And How Solution Providers Can Manage The Transition To Hyper-Convergence

#SimpliVity CEO @DoronKempel is continuing the charge to make his company's hyper-convergence software work with any hardware vendor's server, inking a deal with #Huawei and continuing to court #HewlettPackardEnterprise. At the same time, Kempel finds himself doing battle with #hyperconvergence offerings from legacy hardware vendors and trying to put space between itself and other hyper-convergence startups like #Nutanix. SimpliVity Tuesday said it had struck a deal to offer its all-flash #OmniStack hyper-convergence technology on Huawei's #FusionServer line in a play for market share in Huawei's primary markets, including growing economies in China, India and South America. The move is in response to demand from customers, as well as partners, Kempel said. "Truth be told, we've also been requested by very large systems integrators and value-added resellers to get this done," Kempel said. "We just see great upside from that." Still, Kempel said the transition to selling hyper-convergence can be challenging for solution providers who need to take business from competing solution providers in order to gain traction in the market. "You've been selling a lot of products that you've been making money on and now the customers understand that there's a better way of doing that," Kempel said. "If you're a large VAR, you might be doing half-a-billion or a billion dollars in business a year and now the customers pay less." What follows is an edited excerpt of Kempel's conversation with CRN.

http://m.crn.com/slide-shows/virtualization/300083100/simplivity-ceo-kempel-on-huawei-deal-courting-hpe-and-how-solution-providers-can-manage-the-transition-to-hyper-convergence.htm

SimpliVity and Huawei team up in hyperconverged play

#Hyperconverged: it’s a word which elicits knowing nods from those in the industry, and looks of panic from those few who haven’t heard of it. Yet hyperconverged infrastructure, bundling in compute, storage, networking and virtualisation in a software-centric architecture, is here to stay, and Massachusetts-based #SimpliVity has today announced a deal to put its #OmniStack technology on #Huawei #FusionServer in a new collaboration. The offering is available on SimpliVity's #allflash hyperconverged models. SimpliVity was named as a leader in Gartner’s most recent Magic Quadrant for integrated systems, which covers hyperconvergence, as well as being cited by Computer Weekly as a challenger in the market earlier this year. Alongside Huawei, the company has forged technology alliances with #Cisco, #Lenovo and #Dell. The latter, which bought #EMC for $67 billion in October last year, to also include #VCE and #VMware, refreshed its hyperconverged lineup earlier this year, with a ZDNet article at the time noting that “every enterprise hardware vendor is rushing to this fast-growing space.” This time round, the press materials note that Huawei and SimpliVity are two of the fastest growing IT companies addressing the fastest growing markets with this announcement. “By combining SimpliVity’s revolutionary hyperconverged technology with Huawei’s servers and strong global footprint, more customers will be able to realise the unique benefits that only SimpliVity delivers,” said Doron Kempel, SimpliVity CEO in a statement. “By providing the most complete hyperconverged solution on the industry’s leading server platforms, SimplIVity is putting customer needs front and centre.” Writing for this publication back in October, Geoff Smith, senior manager at GreenPages Technology Solutions, mused on the issue of day two for hyperconverged – not the implementation, but when the platform is spinning away in the data centre. “Adopting hyperconverged as your next-generation technology play is certainly something to consider carefully, and has the potential to positively impact your overall operational maturity,” he wrote. “You can reduce the number of vendor technologies and management interfaces, get more proactive, and make decisions based on real data analytics. “Hyperconverged platforms can certainly enhance and help mature your IT organisations, but they do provide only part of the story,” Smith added. You can read more about SimpliVity and Huawei’s collaboration here.

http://www.cloudcomputing-news.net/news/2016/dec/06/simplivity-and-huawei-team-hyperconverged-play/

SimpliVity Signs Distributor Agreement with Avnet to Deliver Hyperconverged Infrastructure in the US and Latin America

WESTBOROUGH, Mass. & PHOENIX--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- #SimpliVity, a leader in hyperconverged infrastructure that’s revolutionizing enterprise IT, and Avnet, a leading global technology distributor, today announced an agreement to deliver world-class hyperconverged infrastructure solutions to resellers and their customers in the United States and Latin America. Specifically, SimpliVity’s #OmniStack Integrated Solutions with #Cisco UCS will be available through Avnet in the United States and both OmniStack Integrated Solutions with Lenovo System x and OmniStack for Cisco #UCS will be available in Latin America. “SimpliVity has quickly become one of he top vendors in the rapidly accelerating hyperconverged infrastructure market by focusing on significant cost-savings, extensive consolidation capabilities, and first-class customer service,” said Cheryl Neal, vice president of Avnet’s Data and Networking business in the Americas. “I’m confident that this alliance will further accelerate hyperconverged infrastructure opportunities for partners and their customers. Those who want flexibility and choice for converged solutions, along with a top-notch, seamless experience from start to finish will get that with SimpliVity solutions from #Avnet.”
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/simplivity-signs-distributor-agreement-avnet-123000550.html