With improved productivity, better IT resource utilization, and better infrastructure scalability, hyperconverged solutions are becoming a modern alternative to traditional storage appliances. Fueled by next-generation datacenter requirements, software-defined datacenters led in part by hyperconverged infrastructure, are affecting how applications are built and deployed. In short, application providers are realizing turnkey hyperconverged solutions can offer them a competitive edge.

IDC breaks down the software-defined storage market into four subsegments, of which hyperconverged infrastructure is growing the fastest - at 26.6% CAGR1. This should be no surprise since modern enterprises can benefit from a consolidated infrastructure that can eliminate the need for a discrete storage tier and simplify procurement and management of compute and storage.

To that end, Red Hat announced Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure in June last year. Built on Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Virtualization and Red Hat Gluster Storage, Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure provides a single supported infrastructure stack for compute and storage. Because it is designed to be simpler to deploy, easier to integrate and more cost-effective, Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure is a well-suited software-defined platform for application providers to deliver their solutions.

The wave of embedded hyperconverged infrastructure

There are several reasons why software vendors choose hyperconverged infrastructure as a foundation for their products or solutions. An independent software vendor (ISV) may admit that compute and storage infrastructure command the largest portions of the customer’s budget, leaving precious little room for the actual application driving the opportunity. It follows that driving down the infrastructure line item in the purchase order can lead to cost savings for end customers, as well an increased share of wallet for the ISV.

In addition, providing a complete solution can make an application provider more strategic to its customers by enabling a better user experience with more simplified purchasing and installation. There is no need to buy, install and configure a third-party storage platform since the complete solution is packaged together. This can also help provide a single vendor contact for any support issues that may arise during the lifecycle of the product.

When considering hyperconverged infrastructures, there are several options, but we believe Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure offers several distinct advantages over proprietary hyperconverged infrastructure solutions. These include a mature compute layer based on Red Hat Virtualization and a storage layer built on Red Hat Gluster Storage technologies, both with many years of being battle-tested at our customer sites.

And because Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure is an open source solution and runs on multiple X86 server platforms, customers can have a broader choice for server hardware, helping to prevent vendor lock-in. Application vendors can run both Linux and Windows applications on top of Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure, providing more flexibility. Broader choice and greater flexibility are characteristics of open source and some of the reasons why more than 90 percent of companies in the Fortune 500 rely on Red Hat products and services.

How Commvault benefits from Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure

Commvault, a leading provider of data protection, cloud and information management solutions, chose Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure as the underpinnings of its new Commvault HyperScale™ Technology backup and recovery solution offerings.

Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure is included with Commvault HyperScale™ Software and Commvault HyperScale™ Appliance. Commvault HyperScale Software offers a data protection software solution built on reference X86 server platforms from Cisco, Dell-EMC, Fujitsu, HPE, Huawei, Lenovo, Quantum or Super Micro Computer. Its counterpart offering, Commvault HyperScale Appliance is designed to be an all-in-one appliance for customers desiring a simpler purchasing, deployment, management and support approach.

Choosing Red Hat Hyperconverged Infrastructure gives Commvault a scale-out platform as a progression of the purpose-built backup appliance market that enables customers to lower complexity and cost and is different from solutions offered by Commvault’s competitors. By offering more predictable product releases, timely patches and security updates, Red Hat can save Commvault precious developer resources. By working with Red Hat, a brand focused on stronger security, reliability and flexibility, as its technology partner for the underlying infrastructure, Commvault is able to focus on what it does best -- data protection and secondary data management. Software vendors seeking to differentiate themselves and gain more control of the deployment of their solutions in a hyperconverged environment can pursue a similar path and find a technology partner in Red Hat.

Find out more. Send us an email at storage-partners@redhat.com.

1 Worldwide Software-Defined Storage Forecast, 2017–2021: SDS Market Growth Significantly Outpaces Enterprise Storage Growth, Led by HCI (September 2017, IDC #US43062517)