News Release

Next Evolution of VCE Vblock with Cisco ACI Delivers Policy-Driven Flexibility and Simplicity

VCE Vblock System Brings Together Cisco ACI Infrastructure and Operational Elements into Tightly Integrated VCE Vscale Architectural Model
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Nov 23, 2015

SAN JOSE, Calif. and RICHARDSON, Texas – November 23, 2015 – Cisco and VCE today announced the next evolution of the Vblock® System with Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) to make it easier and faster for customers to build flexible, highly secure data centers that can rapidly adapt to changing application and business requirements. The combination of VCE™ Vblock Systems converged infrastructure with Cisco ACI provides the operational simplicity and software-defined innovation necessary to be successful in the cloud era.

Cisco and VCE enable IT organizations to deliver greater business value through simple automation and centralized management and policy-based infrastructure that are attuned to the dynamic requirements of complex, business applications. With ACI on a Vblock System, IT can define a policy based on what an application requires, such as adherence to security compliance and data governance mandates. Cisco ACI will continue to enforce that policy even as the application scales up and scales out as it maintains a superior experience for end users. By extending Cisco ACI to Vblock Systems, customers will be able to quickly manage applications across leading cloud management platforms with a broad choice of network and security services delivered by 45+ technology vendors in the ACI eco-system. Cisco ACI on a VCE Vblock System provides consistency of control across virtual, physical, and container-based workloads while simultaneously providing visibility into application and multi-tenant health through comprehensive and deep telemetry.

“Once we chose to build our software-defined network based on Cisco technologies we started talking to VCE because of its strong relationship with Cisco. It became evident pretty quickly that Cisco ACI on a VCE Vblock System will enable Arqiva to deploy more quickly and have greater operational control through multi-layered security capabilities, to meet business and IT objectives. We also feel confident that the deep engineering knowledge that Cisco and VCE have of one another’s products will ensure we can deploy our new network with minimum risk, and at speed so we can realize the benefits immediately,” said Paul Freemantle, IT & Connectivity Director, Arqiva.

Arqiva, a leading communications infrastructure company, needed a new network so it could adopt a cloud strategy, to improve the efficiency of its IT stack and allow it to invest in new services for its customers. Choosing a Cisco software-defined network will allow Arqiva to gain IT agility, operational simplicity and efficiency to help achieve its business goals. Arqiva will extend the value of its VCE converged infrastructure by gaining application-level control and visibility across its entire data center, so it has network consistency and high-level of security.  The Vblock System with Cisco ACI will simplify troubleshooting to achieve rapid problem resolution for physical, virtual or cloud workloads and enable Arqiva to achieve faster deployment and operational control.

Organizations today have new types of applications—including “third-platform” applications for social and mobile computing, cloud services, big data, and the Internet of Things— that can grow to hundreds of thousands of virtual servers. These new applications as well as traditional mission-critical applications impose new kinds of demands on IT infrastructure. VCE Vscale™ Architecture, an innovative “scale-up” AND “scale out” architecture that delivers simplicity and speed at data center scale, and Cisco ACI complement each other to enable organizations to build the next generation data center. Cisco ACI is designed to provide infrastructure and logical networking framework that can stand multiple VCE converged infrastructure systems together. Cisco ACI introduces a policy model that enables customers to define their networks based off their application requirements while Vscale architecture orchestrates the physical and logical network that ACI provides to enable multiple VCE systems to operate as a single policy automated pool of system resources. Customers then have the ability to decide where to place or move workloads for such instances as disaster recovery to end of quarter requirements to even determining the right location to accommodate large workloads where energy consumption is more cost effective.

“Users in the Wikibon community look to gain competitive advantage with the adoption of new technology. Solutions like VCE Vblock Systems and Vscale architecture will enable data center flexibility and operational simplicity. Vscale architecture leverages Cisco ACI software defined networking to get the functionality and geographical reach customers want,” says Wikibon Senior Analyst Stu Miniman. “VCE does the heavy lifting of extensive revision testing so that IT can spend more time on serving the business.”

VCE & Cisco Quotes:

“Customers are finding that with ACI on a VCE Vblock System they have better visibility across the entire enterprise and application deployment time and time spent on networking administrative activities are significantly reduced. Most importantly, making networking changes are much faster with significantly lower risk, enabling IT to quickly respond to new or changing business requirements. VCE is committed to supporting the customer journey to the hybrid cloud which makes the network increasingly a focal point for optimizing resource pooling and sharing across the hybrid cloud,” said Tim Page, Chief Operating Officer, VCE.

“Managing and deploying applications are critical to how modern enterprises deliver today’s business services. With Cisco ACI on VCE Vblock Systems, IT departments now have the ability to improve business and application agility, scalability and reliability across Vblock Systems as well as beyond Vblock Systems into the network. This solution helps lower the total cost of ownership and brings flexibility to businesses today who require great speed and simplicity to remain competitive,” said Soni Jiandani, Senior Vice President of the Cisco Insieme Networks Business Unit.

ABOUT CISCO

Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the worldwide technology leader that has been making the Internet work since 1984. Our people, products, and partners help society securely connect and seize tomorrow’s digital opportunity today. Discover more at http://thenetwork.cisco.com and follow us on Twitter at @Cisco.

ABOUT VCE

VCE provides converged solutions that accelerate the adoption of cloud-based computing models for enterprises and service providers globally. As part of the EMC Federation, focused on enabling businesses and services providers to transform their operations through cloud computing, VCE’s industry-leading converged infrastructure dramatically simplifies IT. Through innovative products and services, VCE enables customers to focus on business innovation instead of integrating, validating and managing IT infrastructure.

Copyright © 2015 VCE Company, LLC. All rights reserved. VCE, Vblock, Vscale and the VCE logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of VCE Company LLC. All other trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word “partner” or “partnership” does not imply a legal partnership relationship between VCE and any other organization.

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Cisco

Linda Horiuchi

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