Server and Tools Business News Bytes blog : OEM

Microsoft Expands Virtualization Initiatives With HP

grantkd — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 19:14:00 GMT

In support of HP's Virtual Connect announcement, this morning Microsoft announced product, sales and services initiatives with HP designed to help businesses more easily adopt and deploy virtualization to help lower IT costs and make IT more efficient. Microsoft and HP have expanded their work together to sell and market storage, server and networking consolidation solutions, and desktop virtualization solutions, to small, medium and large business customers worldwide. Companies such as MLS Property Information Network are already using Microsoft and HP virtualization technology to more easily meet their business needs.

Today's announcements include the following:

In the U.S., Microsoft is working with HP to offer products, training and deployment services for storage, networking and server consolidation that are designed to help customers decrease costs, increase business agility, improve data access and protection, and increase employee productivity.

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 and Microsoft System Center are supported on the new industry-standard HP Virtual Connect 10Gb Flex-10 module, which works with the Flex-10 NIC on the recently introduced HP ProLiant BL495c virtualization blade server. Together these technologies enable customers to significantly lower costs with their server and network consolidation, business continuity and dynamic datacenter projects.

The HP and Microsoft Frontline Partner Program in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) has registered 60 percent of eligible partners across 36 countries to receive access to virtualization training, sales tools, marketing materials, workshops, and incentives targeting small and medium-size businesses.

Performance and Resource Optimization (PRO) features will be delivered in the HP ProLiant PRO Management Pack for Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manage, running on HP ProLiant and BladeSystem servers, in December 2008. PRO is a feature of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 that enables dynamic management of virtual machines and the associated host platforms.

HP Business Service Automation will enable automation of change and configuration management processes across virtual and physical environments for Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V environments, and will integratewith System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 for managing advanced platform capabilities, while decreasing downtime associated with uncontrolled change. HP is scheduled to release a beta in Q1 2009.

For more information please visit Microsoft PressPass.

PCs Make a Fashion Statement at PROJECT

grantkd — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 21:04:00 GMT

This week in Las Vegas, Microsoft will participate in PROJECT, a global fashion tradeshow where designers, buyers and celebrities converge to determine fashion trends. At the show, Microsoft will showcase a variety of stylish Windows-based (PCs) available from their Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) partners, including Acer, Asus, Ego, Flybook, Gateway, HP and Sony. They will also highlight the Windows Lifestyle, a reference to all the different devices and tools that Windows supports, from mobile phones and PCs, to the Windows Live services that allow consumers stay connected.

For more information check out the PressPass article on Microsoft.com.

Microsoft and Sun Expand Strategic Alliance

grantkd — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 13:14:00 GMT

Microsoft Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc. today announced that Sun has signed on as a Windows Server^® OEM. Additionally, Sun and Microsoft will collaborate to further enable deployment of Windows Server on Sun x64 systems.

Key components in today’s announcement include:

•	Windows Server OEM agreement. Sun will offer Windows Server on their x64 hardware and will provide additional utilities and value-added software offerings to server systems carrying Windows Server. Windows Server 2003 will be available on Sun x64 systems within 90 days.
•	Sun x64 systems and storage. Microsoft recognizes Sun’s compelling x64 server and storage products in the market today. Microsoft and Sun will continue to work together to test and validate the Windows platform on these systems for scale-up enterprise computing.
•	Solaris and Windows virtualization. Sun and Microsoft will work together to ensure that Solaris runs well as a guest on Microsoft virtualization technologies and that Windows Server runs well as a guest in Sun’s virtualization technologies. Sun and Microsoft will work together on a support process for customers using the virtualization solutions. This joint commitment to customers ensures that Windows and Solaris will provide a solid virtualization experience.
•	Expanded IPTV partnership. Sun and Microsoft will continue to collaborate to advance the worldwide deployment of the Microsoft Mediaroom™ IPTV and multimedia platform on Sun server and storage systems. AT&T U-verse digital TV offering has chosen Sun for one of world’s largest deployments of the Microsoft Mediaroom platform, which includes server and client software. The combination of Sun’s server solutions and Microsoft’s TV software technology and expertise is expected to speed time to market for IPTV services, while providing superior cost and performance characteristics for communications service providers worldwide.
•	Expanded investment in interoperability. Microsoft and Sun will build an Interoperability Center on Microsoft’s Redmond campus. The center will include a demonstration area for Sun x64 systems, act as a working lab for Windows on Sun benchmarks and sales tools, and support customers running proofs of concept for projects focused on Windows on Sun x64 systems, including joint Sun/Microsoft solutions in areas such as databases, e-mail and messaging, virtualization, and Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) support in Sun Ray thin clients. The Interoperability Center will expand Sun’s presence on the Microsoft main campus, adding to existing Sun systems showcased and customer-tested in the Microsoft Enterprise Engineering Center.

This continued investment in interoperability builds on the initial cooperation agreement between the two companies, initiated in April 2004. Since then Microsoft and Sun have collaborated on interoperability for Web services, identity management, thin clients, systems management and Windows Server engineering. Sun offers Windows Server installation and staging services through its Customer Ready Systems program, providing support for customers with more advanced pre-integration and testing needs. The two companies have also created a basis for tighter interoperability between Platform Enterprise Edition (Java EE), the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 and Windows Communication Foundation in Sun’s Web services interoperability technologies (called Project Tango). Sun is also a founding member of the Microsoft Interop Vendor Alliance and a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

More information on Windows on Sun’s x64 systems is available at http://www.sun.com/software/windows.

More information on Windows 64-bit computing is available at http://www.microsoft.com/servers/64bit/overview.mspx.