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EMC’s VMware-integrated hybrid cloud solution was a 2014 enterprise reference architecture, not a single appliance. Announced at EMC World in Las Vegas on May 6, 2014, it combined EMC storage and data protection, VMware virtualization and cloud management, VMware vCloud Hybrid Service, and Pivotal application-platform and big-data software into a software-defined data-center design.

What EMC announced in May 2014

The EMC Hybrid Cloud solution was intended to help an IT department operate as a broker of services across its own data center and public clouds. EMC described a model in which administrators could publish services through a self-service catalog, automate provisioning, meter usage, and retain visibility and control over where workloads ran.

The announcement came from EMC World 2014. Its claims describe the product strategy and planned capabilities at that date; they are not evidence of current availability, independent performance, or a guaranteed implementation time.

What EMC, VMware and Pivotal supplied

Layer Named technology or contribution Role in the architecture
Infrastructure and data protection EMC storage and data-protection products Provided the storage foundation and protection services for workloads and cloud operations.
Virtualization and cloud management VMware virtualization and cloud-management software Managed virtualized workloads and the policies used to deliver cloud services.
Public-cloud extension VMware vCloud Hybrid Service Extended the operating model from the private data center into a VMware-based public-cloud service.
Platform services Pivotal CF Platform as a Service Supported application deployment through a platform-as-a-service layer.
Big-data services Pivotal Big Data Suite Added the big-data software component identified in the announcement.

At announcement time, EMC said VMware environments were supported. It described OpenStack and Microsoft environment support as planned, so those integrations should not be read as generally available features in May 2014.

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How the proposed hybrid-cloud operating model worked

One service catalog for different destinations

Users could request approved services from a catalog rather than asking administrators to build each environment manually. The target was a common request and provisioning experience whether a workload stayed in the private cloud or was placed with a public-cloud provider.

Policy-guided workload placement

EMC positioned the solution as a way to assess where an application should run and to retain visibility and control over that decision. Placement could therefore be treated as an operational and policy choice instead of a permanent commitment to one location.

Automation, metering and transparency

The announcement highlighted automated application provisioning, service metering, monitoring, and usage transparency. These functions were meant to show which services were consumed and support internal service-broker operations. EMC presented the resulting agility and efficiency as benefits; the release did not provide an independent customer study or comparative benchmark proving them.

Application and service-provider interoperability

The design aimed to connect traditional enterprise applications and newer platform-based workloads with public-cloud capacity. In the 2014 announcement, EMC named VMware’s vCloud Hybrid Service as the public-cloud extension and cited partner participation from Canopy, CSC, Dimension Data, and Rackspace.

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What the “48 hours” demonstration meant

EMC said a team from EMC Global Services and Engineering would attempt to build the reference architecture in 48 hours or less at EMC World. The planned demonstration scope included:

  • Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
  • Platform as a Service (PaaS)
  • Backup as a Service
  • Disaster Recovery as a Service
  • Monitoring, metering and usage transparency
  • Continuous availability
  • Off-premises application mobility
  • Deployments of Microsoft, Oracle, SAP and Pivotal CF applications

That figure described a planned trade-show build. It was not a typical-customer deployment metric or a guarantee that an organization could implement the architecture in two days.

How the later 28-day claim fits the timeline

Date Milestone What it established
May 6, 2014 EMC Hybrid Cloud announcement at EMC World A software-defined data-center reference architecture combining EMC, VMware and Pivotal components, with VMware vCloud Hybrid Service named for public-cloud extension.
October 2014 Enterprise Hybrid Cloud Solution launch, as described in EMC’s 2014 annual report A separate launch integrating EMC and VMware hardware, software and services, designed to enable IT as a Service in as few as 28 days.

The annual report said the Enterprise Hybrid Cloud solution supported traditional and next-generation applications and public-cloud interoperability including VMware vCloud Air. “As few as 28 days” was EMC’s stated solution deployment horizon, not an independently verified average.

What was distinctive about the architecture

It was an integrated stack rather than a lone product

The announcement tied storage, protection, virtualization, management, platform services and public-cloud access together. Customers would have been adopting an architecture and associated implementation services, not buying a consumer device with a single installation wizard.

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It treated IT as a service broker

EMC’s stated objective was to let IT deliver services from in-house infrastructure or a public cloud while applying common tools and processes. VMware executive Bill Fathers said the solution would let organizations extend their data centers into the cloud using the tools and processes already in place. That statement is a vendor quotation and should be understood as promotional positioning.

It covered more than virtual machines

By including Pivotal CF and the Pivotal Big Data Suite alongside VMware infrastructure, the design addressed platform-based and data-intensive applications as well as conventional virtualized workloads.

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Important limits when interpreting the 2014 announcement

  • The May announcement was a historical product description. It does not establish that the same packaging, integrations or services exist today.
  • OpenStack and Microsoft support were described as planned at announcement time, not as completed May 2014 capabilities.
  • The 48-hour figure applied to a planned EMC World demonstration.
  • The 28-day figure came from EMC’s later annual-report description of the Enterprise Hybrid Cloud launch and was company-stated.
  • No independent customer outcome study or comparative performance statistic was identified in the cited official materials.
  • Actual deployment would have depended on infrastructure, software licensing, skills, security and governance requirements, and the participating service providers.

Bottom line for understanding EMC’s VMware-integrated cloud strategy

EMC’s 2014 solution was an attempt to make hybrid cloud an operational model: EMC supplied storage and protection, VMware supplied the virtualization and management foundation plus vCloud service integration, and Pivotal supplied application-platform and big-data layers. The promised outcome was self-service, automated and metered delivery across private and public clouds. The announcement’s speed figures and benefit claims were EMC statements tied to a demonstration or later solution launch, not general deployment guarantees.

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