Nutanix HCI Now Integrated into HPE ProLiant DX Servers for Ease of Use

Nutanix has unveiled the general availability of new HPE ProLiant DX and Apollo servers that are delivered with the fully-installed Nutanix HCI platform, as well as well as Nutanix HCI services that are fully integrated with the HPE GreenLake as a Service platform.

The new product offerings come after the two companies deepened their partnership in April based on feedback from the marketplace, partners and customers.

In addition, Nutanix also announced that its hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) platform has now been integrated with the ServiceNow IT Operations Management platform to allow ServiceNow customers to directly gain access to Nutanix-powered IT services and get direct notification of critical incidents related to Nutanix HCI in their private clouds.

Nutanix’s Greg Smith

Greg Smith, vice president of product marketing for Nutanix, told Channel Futures that the HPE ProLiant DX and HPE GreenLake news will boost channel partners that want to help customers run the Nutanix HCI platform on HPE servers which are fully integrated with the application. For those customers, partners will be able to sell Nutanix software that is integrated with HPE ProLiant servers that are being sold as turnkey appliances.

“Nutanix has a growing number of customers who wanted a Nutanix software experience, but who wanted to run Nutanix on HPE server platforms,” he said. “The two companies have heard this market demand and have answered.”

At the same time, customers who want Nutanix HCI as a service will now be able to get it through HPE’s GreenLake services. This is targeted at HPE customers who would like to run Nutanix, but who want to consume it as a service, said Smith.

Nutanix made its software available to run on HPE hardware more than 18 months ago, but now these fully integrated products are available to make it easier to do.

“What it brings to partners is they now have more options that they can bring to their clients,” said Smith. “They can bring two different consumption models to their customers.”

Customers who choose the HPE GreenLake services will be able to use Nutanix’s enterprise cloud software, including its built-in AHV hypervisor, to run a fully HPE-managed private cloud. Using GreenLake as a service offerings, customers and partners will only pay for the services they use. The HPE ProLiant DX appliances are built with Nutanix software pre-installed and shipped from HPE factories.

IDC’s Eric Sheppard

Eric Sheppard, an analyst with IDC, said there is no question that channel partners will welcome this offering.

“It’s opening up the Nutanix stack to a whole bunch of folks who are standardized on HPE servers,” said Sheppard. “Considering the volume and market share that HPE has, that’s just massive.”

The latest offering offers a much higher level of support and cooperation from the two companies than was available previously, he said. “This is a really strong bond between the companies.”

Nutanix Integration with ServiceNow IT Operations Management

The integration of the Nutanix HCI platform and ServiceNow’s IT operations management product means that partners will have another solution they can bring to their…

…customers to help build private cloud infrastructures, said Smith.

The integrated product will allow ServiceNow customers to discover Nutanix HCI environments automatically but will also give them access to Nutanix-powered IT services and to notifications of critical incidents happening within their private clouds.

“This will enable Nutanix partners to help their customers with private cloud that will provide a higher degree of automation as well as self-service capabilities for internal IT users,” said Smith. “And they have opportunities to help clients fully integrate Nutanix and ServiceNow to meet the specific needs of each organization. Knowing that every customer’s private cloud deployment is different, this gives partners the ability to provide the most value for customers.”

The integration was developed after Nutanix and HPE received a number of requests from partners and customers for the combination, he said. “Both companies stepped up and formed a relationship and had their development teams work together.”

The Nutanix ServiceNow integration means that customers will be able to automate mundane tasks to help streamline IT processes. By automating the most requested services and workflows, IT teams will be able to reduce time spent on servicing incidents and issues and focus on running their data centers more efficiently. Nutanix integration with ServiceNow is available immediately as an integrated plug-in in the ServiceNow Store for Nutanix Calm.

Enderle Group’s Robert Enderle

Rob Enderle, principal analyst with Enderle Group, said the Nutanix integration into ServiceNow should be attractive for ServiceNow users.

“Automation remains a general trend transcending industries,” he said. This latest integration provides an opportunity for both Nutanix and ServiceNow channel partners to sell to a larger customer base comprising both vendors, he added.

“Enterprise customers love it when otherwise competing vendors cooperate and collaborate because it makes interoperation easer and most accounts are mixed,” said Enderle. “This partnership between HP and Nutanix should open the door for channel partners of both firms to better sell and service blended solutions that better meet customer needs than current individual offerings can.”