Another debate is over ... and I am not referring to the US presidential election ... I am referring to the growing maturity of OpenStack and its level of adoption in the marketplace. Over 7,500 people attended the last OpenStack Summit in Austin, TX. The energy at the event was palpable. Various organizations stepped forward and touted the virtues associated with their OpenStack implementations.

However, talking to developers and IT architects one of worst kept secrets inevitably continues to bubble up. OpenStack can be complicated. It can be argued that OpenStack is primarily a project and not a product per se. Numerous new projects and a rapid six-month release cycle make it difficult to keep up with innovation while still achieving return on your investment. There is no easy way to test upgrades, and when you need support there is no 'easy button' or toll free number to call.

Source: OpenStack Training Guides

Nonetheless, the benefits are outweighing the risks. OpenStack is of strategic importance to a growing number of organizations. In fact,65%of cloud adopters say OpenStack is important to their cloud strategy, via open source and/or commercial distributions (Source: IDC InfoBrief, sponsored by Cisco, Don't Get Left Behind: The Business Benefits of Achieving Greater Cloud Adoption, Aug 2015) And the most cited benefits include and are not limited to the ability to reduce costs and accelerate innovation while avoiding vendor lock-in.

These are some of the dynamics that have prompted us to offer our customers a variety of consumption models that can dramatically simplify their OpenStack deployments. In fact, with Cisco you can:

1. Build and manage your OpenStack environment yourself on Cisco UCS or FlexPod while tapping directly into the OpenStack APIs. Skilled developers can leverage their existing capabilities and customize the deployment to their liking.
2. With Cisco Metapod, you can consume your OpenStack private cloud as a service while retaining ownership of your IT assets and running your private cloud on premises. A team of Cisco experts builds, deploys, and provides ongoing operations, proactive monitoring and response, and upgrades via this production-ready solution 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
3. And you can use Platform as a Service (PaaS) solutions like Pivotal Cloud Foundry or Apprenda that work well on OpenStack and provide additional capabilities to develop your applications. They can simplify the deployment of hybrid cloud applications, or help your developers move more quickly existing Java and .Net applications to OpenStack environments.

Regarding option#1,jointly developed by industry leaders Cisco, Intel, and Red Hat, Cisco? UCS? Integrated Infrastructure for Red Hat? Enterprise Linux? OpenStack Platformcombines computing, networking, storage, management, and cloud orchestration into a single platform for deploying IT-as-a-Service environments and beyond. With documented design and deployment guidelines, proven configurations with bills of materials, coordinated support, and expert services, this integrated solution accelerates deployment and delivers the scalability, manageability, reliability, and high availability needed for production operation.

DeployingRed Hat Enterprise Linux OpenStack Platform on Cisco UCS Integrated Infrastructureprovides broad functionality for your cloud environment without requiring complicated integration. In essence, this jointly engineered solution can:

• Reduce deployment complexity and risk
• Increase flexibility for future cloud deployments
• Improve operational efficiency
• Accelerate your Return on Investment

There has never been a better time for you to deploy your OpenStack cloud on Cisco UCS and quickly demonstrate its business value in your organization.For a limited time, at no cost to you we can provide a loaner hardware kit, evaluation software, fixed-scope starter services delivered by Cisco and Red Hat(see our POC Program details). This offer is applicable only to qualified use cases and opportunities in the Americas and Europe. Contact your account representative or email us to find out more and discuss eligibility criteria in more detail.

Additional Resources

Cisco OpenStack Website