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Q & A
Consolidation Chalk Talk
Consolidation was discussed and debated among Sun executives and a group of journalists at a recent Chalk Talk in San Francisco, led by Ken Won who is a Sun director in charge of company-wide consolidation efforts. Following is an excerpt from the discussion:
Tuesday, Mar 16, 1:30 PM PT
Q: There are lots of definitions for consolidation in the marketplace, could you define what Sun means?
A: Sometimes it's a matter of application consolidation, where servers are not being efficiently utilized. Companies that have been through mergers or acquisitions frequently have underutilized gear simply because their IT operations have not been fully integrated. Other times it can be a matter of physical space where the sheer volume of equipment in a data center is too great to justify the cost of real estate. Recently, a customer of ours decided to consolidate because the lease on their equipment was about to expire, which presented an opportunity to re-evaluate their infrastructure and make some changes to optimize their server and storage environment.
Q: What are some of the pain points that trigger companies to embark on a consolidation?
A: Consolidation is the best way to build an IT infrastructure that effectively meets today's business demands and is ready for future growth. Several factors influence how and when a company is willing to change, and these include the desire to reduce complexity, simplify system administration and improve performance and manageability. Some of the more pressing needs we've heard from customers recently are centered around improving business continuity and security capabilities.
Q: Isn't consolidation becoming less of an issue now that the economy is improving and IT managers have a little more room in their budgets?
A: This is a common misperception. Even though IT managers might have more funds available today than they did a few years ago, the lessons learned during the down economy about being fiscally accountable will last for a long time. Companies will always strive to reduce IT costs, improve administration and increase utilization of resources. There's never been a better time for a company to consider the benefits of consolidation.
Q: Given the current security issues and breaches that some companies are experiencing, are there examples of applications that companies would not want to consolidate onto the same server?
A: We recommend three rules of thumb for companies concerned about security issues: minimize, standardize and harden. Minimizing server sprawl is an immediate way to reduce complexity and identify weaknesses that could potentially become security risks. Next, standardizing systems makes it significantly easier for IT teams to detect even the slightest change in their environment, including intrusion. Lastly, hardening is an assessment process to remove vulnerabilities particularly at the operating system level. Sun has a number of new technologies built into our own operating system, Solaris, that makes it extremely difficult to fall prey to security threats.
Q: What advice do you have for a company considering a consolidation?
A: The most important advice I have is to engage support at the CXO level. Many companies approach consolidation as an IT issue, yet the implications -- and resulting benefits -- are much broader. In fact, the net result is that a company can reduce costs, achieve better utilization and simplify management of IT operations. This is good news for the entire organization.
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