IBM hardware has once again become the focus.
Since 1993, IBM began to transform into software and services, IBM's hardware business has been calm. Until IBM announced the information infrastructure strategy in 2008, and then the intelligent information architecture in September 2009, the ripple gradually turned into a torrent. If the focus of IBM's information architecture strategy is to integrate data centers, then intelligent information architecture is to strengthen automation management and achieve simple goals on the basis of further integration.
Take storage as the core
The driving force of IBM's series of actions is the explosion of the data universe. In May 2009, IDC released the report "Economic Shrinking, Digital Universe Expanding", claiming that the current global digital content is about 487 billion GB, and the operating cost is about 12 trillion US dollars. If these data contents are printed and bound into a book, their height is more than 9 times the distance from the earth to Pluto; If the generation speed of digital content is converted into the thickening speed of books, it is faster than NASA's fastest space shuttle.
Storage is no longer a single access device, but provides a good support for the use of upper information. The rapid growth of information makes the retrieval of valuable information a difficult problem. In the past, simple information storage is no longer the most urgent need of enterprises. On the other hand, the information management work is becoming increasingly heavy, so how to clear the junk information to release more storage space is imminent. The client/server model, which has been used for decades, is transforming into a network-based architecture. The data center has changed from focusing on computing power to focusing on information value. The competition of single product market such as server, storage, security and network has gradually evolved into the competition of comprehensive solutions with the whole data center as the core, in which storage is the key. From network storage such as SAN and NAS, to storage virtualization, thin configuration, deduplication, hierarchical storage, snapshot and continuous data protection, to virtual tape library and disaster recovery, storage has become a new development core.
The purchasing strategy of enterprises is also changing. In the past, when considering storage, enterprises always considered how many terabytes of capacity to buy. Nowadays, when building information storage architecture, enterprises not only consider storage capacity, but also pay more attention to how to adapt storage to the needs of business and applications. Different businesses and applications such as core banking system, telecom billing system, enterprise ERP system, business intelligence system, streaming media system and historical information query system can adopt different storage technologies, such as OLTP database, data archiving and historical information storage.
General trend of integration
The integration of data centers is the general trend. Integration can eliminate redundancy and improve the operation efficiency of equipment. The content of integration includes hardware and hardware integration, hardware and software integration, and hardware and service integration.
In recent years, IBM has continuously strengthened its three product lines of server, storage and network through technology research and development, acquisition and OEM. In 2007 and 2008, IBM acquired eight companies providing storage solutions. In 2009, IBM introduced DS5020, which further improved the low-end storage product line. In August 2009, IBM released VMControl virtualization management software, which has the ability to manage mainframes, Power servers and x86 servers in a unified way.
Returning to the network market after 10 years is IBM's most important strategic move in data center integration. In July 2009, IBM announced that it had reached an OEM cooperation agreement with Juniper and Brocade to sell the switches and routers produced by these two companies in an OEM way, making them a part of IBM series products. Hou Miao, general manager of the system storage department of IBM Systems and Technology Division in Greater China, told the media: "In the current complex enterprise environment, the networks of many data centers have actually been closely integrated with servers and storage. Therefore, enterprises urgently need an integrated framework. " The network products produced by IBM this time can only meet the requirements of network layer and transport layer protocols. If we want to respond to business changes in time, we should also realize dynamic architecture, that is, meet the requirements of seven-layer network protocols. Therefore, vendors focusing on application delivery, such as F5 and Bluecoat, are likely to be IBM's next acquisition or cooperation targets.
As a giant in the network industry, Cisco's entry into the server field is regarded as a challenge to IBM. But in fact, IBM did not pose a competitive posture, but continued to strengthen cooperation with Cisco, and will resell Cisco's latest optical fiber Ethernet storage switch in September 2009. These seemingly abnormal actions just reflect the general trend of data center integration. Vendors are no longer competing in one city and one pool, but at the level of the whole data center. From this point of view, whether network vendors, storage vendors or security vendors, with the passage of time, these vendors have begun to extend to other fields, forming an intersection with each other, and finally forming a pattern in which you have me and I have you.
If the integration of hardware is still in a fierce battle, then IBM has taken the lead in the integration of software and hardware services. This leading edge of IBM is mainly due to a bet made by Guo Shina 16 years ago: In the future, customers will pay more attention to those companies that can provide total solutions, that is, technical solutions that can integrate computer components provided by various suppliers and companies that can integrate technology into an enterprise process. Chip speed, software versions, proprietary systems and other similar things will all die. The information technology industry will become a service-oriented industry, not a technical industry.
Seeds planted in Guo Shina produced melons. On September 9, 2009, a document submitted by IBM to the US Securities and Exchange Commission showed that the pre-tax profit of IBM software and services increased at a double-digit rate, from 7.2% in 2002 to 16. 1% in 2008. In the second quarter of 2009, the financial report showed that IBM's total revenue reached $23.3 billion, down 13% year-on-year, but its net profit was $3 1 100 million, up 12% year-on-year.
IBM has set up a new integration center for high availability and disaster recovery solutions. Vincent Hsu, chief inventor and chief storage architect of IBM, said that unlike the physical disaster recovery center established by IBM in China for hosting business, the high availability and disaster recovery solution integration center is a virtual center providing consulting services. The center integrates IBM's global expert resources (including data center, system, storage and design), which can not only make full use of foreign advanced technology and experience, but also enable these foreign experts to understand the different needs of domestic users. The center is equivalent to a think tank.
Disaster tolerance system is a rather complicated information system, including network, server, storage, system software, application software and so on. , but also involves the cooperation of different departments. For example, IBM systems and the Ministry of Science and Technology provide hardware products related to disaster recovery infrastructure, IBM Consulting Department helps users consult the whole disaster recovery architecture, and IBM Service Department helps users implement disaster recovery. At the IBM Intelligent Information Architecture Summit Forum, about 400 enterprise technical leaders from all over the country answered their most interesting questions. The first choice is an integrated high-availability disaster recovery solution, and the second choice is cloud storage.
Cloud storage is a new concept derived from the concept of cloud computing. It refers to a system that integrates a large number of different types of storage devices in the network through application software through cluster application, grid technology or distributed file system, and provides data storage and business access functions. When the core of computing and processing in the cloud computing system is the storage and management of a large amount of data, it is necessary to configure a large number of storage devices in the cloud computing system. In this case, the cloud computing system is transformed into a cloud storage system. Cloud storage is a cloud computing system with data storage and management as its core.
Judging from the current situation, the demand of enterprises for data storage and management may exceed the demand for data processing, that is, high-performance computing. Vincent Hsu told reporters that the US government requires the preservation of all medical data of children from birth to death, including many unstructured data, such as video materials. Faced with such a huge amount of data, the enterprise's own storage system is unable to support it. In addition, some emergencies may also cause a surge in storage in a short time. Like Michael. After Jackson died, all kinds of information related to him increased rapidly. These situations may cause the enterprise's own storage system to be overwhelmed. The core of IBM cloud storage is simplification. Taking power supply as an example, the process from power generation to transmission and distribution is very complicated, but people don't need to consider so much when using electricity, just press the switch. This is to use electricity as a resource. So is cloud storage. The most important thing is to integrate the whole system, including storage, server, network, middleware, application software and process design, to ensure the availability and security of the system. In IBM's cloud strategy, virtualization technology is very critical.
straightforward procedure
The general trend of the world, divided for a long time, divided for a long time. The integration of data centers will eventually be decomposed, but the division here is different from that in the Three Kingdoms era. It is to decompose complex and huge systems into the hands of end users in a simple and easy way. If the integration of data centers is a means to cope with the increase in data volume, then simplicity and ease of use is the eternal pursuit of the Chief Information Officer (CIO). At the IBM Intelligent Information Architecture Summit Forum, the CIO attending the meeting said that the most urgent problem to be solved at present is the high complexity of storage management. To solve this problem, IBM's prescription is intelligence and automation.
In 2008, IBM acquired XIV, a private storage technology company in Tel Aviv, Israel, with a rumored transaction price of $350 million. The acquisition was fruitful in 2009. Liaoning Unicom is an important customer of XIV. Chang Qiang, manager of the maintenance department of Liaoning Unicom billing center, said: "XIV's innovative storage architecture can realize self-adjustment and meet the needs of repeated configuration of test storage space. XIV's unique minute-level self-recovery function helps us reduce risks and ensure the stable operation of the system. The self-management feature of XIV can greatly simplify system maintenance and solve the problem of high maintenance cost of the original system. XIV, a smarter storage architecture, provides a more efficient information application platform for the launch of a new generation of telecommunications services. "
XIV can get such a high evaluation from users, mainly due to its unique design concept. XIV is a block-based cluster storage system, which is composed of standard components such as processors and SATA drives. It consists of many data units based on SATA disks, and each data unit can be regarded as a small PC, which forms a cluster through standard Ethernet connection. Data is stored in all data units, and the capacity and performance will change with the increase or decrease of data units. From the global situation, the most important and critical information must be stored in the expensive main storage system, and the XIV storage system based on grid technology reduces the hardware investment while ensuring the instant availability and reliability of information.
Remarkably, the chairman of XIV Company is none other than moshe yanai, who is called by many as the father of EMC's flagship storage array, Symmetrix. As the engineering director of EMC, moshe yanai is the chief architect of Symmetrix.
In addition to acquisitions, IBM has also invested a lot in independent research and development, and intelligent layering is one of them. At present, 36% of data analysis is done by hand. However, the way of manually analyzing data is out of date. Data is not static, but dynamic. Intelligent hierarchical storage technology automatically stores data on appropriate media in time through intelligent algorithms, and can realize data movement transparently. Automatic management of mixed load can also play a role similar to intelligent hierarchical storage technology.
Whether it is intelligent hierarchical storage technology or automatic management of mixed load, the similarity is to use storage software to analyze where there are hot spots in the system, and reallocate resources accordingly, and automatically migrate hot spot data to other storage media to achieve load balance. This is also the concrete embodiment of the idea of changing as needed.
The speed of flash memory is 100 times that of disk, but the energy consumption is less than 1/3 of disk. If all storage hotspots are concentrated on flash memory, the workload of other media can be greatly reduced and the speed of the whole system will be faster. This is the idea that constants should be changed. At present, some academicians of IBM are doing basic scientific research on solid-state storage. In the future, IBM plans to put flash memory on the cache, which does not need batteries.
In addition, storage virtualization, data deduplication, full performance storage (the technology of the next generation XIV), storage management technology and encryption of tapes and disks can simplify the structure of data centers in all aspects, and achieve the effect of easy use and energy saving.
Rain and dew in the clouds
A common example in martial arts novels is that a top swordsman can use a sword with both hands, but the enemy often only pays attention to his habitual right hand, and as a result, he reveals a flaw and gets a fatal sword from the swordsman's left hand.
IBM's left hand is another bet made by Guo Shina 16 years ago: independent computing will give way to networked computing. If it was the popularity of the Internet at that time, it might be understood as the service-oriented cloud computing based on the Internet now.
In recent years, IBM has gradually stripped off hardware services such as PC, hard disk, driver, monitor, printer, etc. Only servers and storage can't shake it. This is not only because the server and storage business can make money, but more importantly, they are the core of the data center.
IBM is committed to strengthening the deployment of these two product lines, returning to the network market and bringing its hardware back into the spotlight. All this shows that IBM is betting on cloud computing in Guo Shina.
Everything IBM has done about the integration and simplification of data centers is accumulating water vapor for the cloud of cloud computing. What cloud computing needs is a larger-scale data integration, and then the calculation is diverted to users. This process of first concentration and then distribution will certainly promote the development of new information construction mode. As for when it will rain, we will wait and see.