HP Cloud Services Enters Beta with Multiple Vendor Support

HP‘s (NYSE: HPQ) recently announced HP Public Cloud initiative now has some elements in public beta, with a slew of companies immediately jumping in to offer technologies ranging from applications to mobility to security.

The HP Cloud Compute, HP Cloud Object Storage and HP Cloud Content Delivery Network elements of HP Cloud Services are now officially open for use, although in beta form (which means there probably are some kinks yet to be worked out). The HP Cloud Services infrastructure is built on the OpenStack platform, and the company wants you to hear a buzzword: no “vendor lock-in.” According to HP, the HP Cloud Services architecture “improves developer productivity, features a full stack of easy-to-use tools for faster time to code, provides access to a rich partner ecosystem, and is backed by personalized customer support.”

“Whether you are an independent developer, ISV or the CIO of a major organization, the priority is to design your applications for today’s cloud economy,” said Zorawar Singh, VP and GM of HP Cloud Services, in the press release announcing the beta. “We will continue to build, integrate and deploy developer-focused features, designed to support a world-class cloud that enables our customers and partners to run and operate web services at scale, on a global basis.”

When I did my daily review of the press releases this morning, it seemed as though every vendor and its cousin had signed on to support the HP Cloud Services. At last count there were nearly 40 companies.

Here are the new members of the HP Cloud partner ecosystem:

Information on HP Cloud Services pricing is available here.

In April 2012 Joe Panettieri sat down with Singh at the OpenStack Design Summit to discuss HP’s public cloud strategy.

Regarding OpenStack, Singh noted, “OpenStack allowed us to accelerate into the cloud market fairly quickly. We evaluated a bunch of stacks. It’s a very important ingredient to our strategy. But it’s one of several open source movements we’ll support.” He added, “We’ve been impressed with CloudStack and we’re glad to see it moving along, and we’re happy to see Eucalyptus working with Amazon. But look at the ecosystem and OpenStack looks impressive.”

Without prompting, Singh spoke about HP’s work with its partners: “We have a huge channel dependency. Sixty percent of our business is though the channel. We think that’s an advantage, and having a partner- and channel-ready mindset is super important.”

These are significant comments coming from a key figure in HP’s sphere of influence.

Talkin’ Cloud readers can click here to read the overview for the HP Cloud Services partner program.