Forrester Research believes that companies need a new generation of management tools to keep the heterogeneous components of a hybrid cloud under control. In a detailed comparison, newcomers like RightScale or CliQr do better than the heavyweights Microsoft, IBM or VMware.
• Hybrid has become the dominant deployment model for cloud
computing
• Hybrid cloud management tools offer automation and
orchestration functions in particular
• Newcomers like CliQr, RightScale, Scalr or even Dell are challenging established management providers like IBM or VMware
if Companieswant to expand the use of cloud services, they quickly reach their limits. None of the platforms available today can cover all the requirements of developers and IT managers alike, argues Dave Bartoletti, Principal Analyst at the market research and consulting firm Forrester . In an international survey, almost two thirds of IT professionals stated that they used more than one public or private cloud at the same time. What some market observers have been predicting for years now seems to be confirmed: The hybrid cloud has become the dominant deployment model. More and more organizations are combining public cloud resources with private cloud infrastructures; many use multiple public or private cloud platforms.
In order to still be able to control all these assets,
companies should move in a management software layer, advises Bartoletti. With
this in mind, he has the leading providers in the hybrid cloud marketmanagement
put under the microscope - with quite surprising results, because it is not the
usual suspects who are at the top of the ranking.
Forrester analyst Dave Bartoletti took a
closer look at the leading tools for hybrid cloud management.
The analyst divides the market for Hybrid cloudManagement
Solutions (HCMS) in two categories. On the one hand, there are a number of
relatively new providers who primarily rely on platform-independent management frameworks.
These include tools from RightScale , CliQr , Dell (Cloud Manager) and Scalr .
They are not geared towards the infrastructure of a cloud provider and,
according to the Forrester experts, are particularly suitable for managing many
different clouds. In the overall ranking, products from these four companies
come off the best by far. The second group includes established providers such
as VMware , Red Hat and IBMwho have added cloud management features to their
existing virtualization management systems.