BWI: Organizations Speed Business Results with New Appliances from HP and Microsoft

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Microsoft
Thursday, January 27, 2011 04:30 PM IST (11:00 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Information technology; Technology
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Organizations Speed Business Results with New Appliances from HP and Microsoft
New solutions for business intelligence, data warehouse, messaging and database consolidation help increase employee productivity and reduce IT complexity

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Thursday, January 27, 2011 -- (Business Wire India) -- HP and Microsoft Corp. today announced a portfolio of four new converged application appliances that fuse applications, infrastructure and productivity tools into a single system. These solutions help organizations optimize employee productivity and decision-making, while simplifying the delivery of applications for IT.(1) The HP Business Decision Appliance is available now to run business intelligence services, and the HP E5000 Messaging System for Microsoft Exchange Server is planned to be available in 45 days to run messaging services. Two other appliances are expected to be available later this year.

Until now there have been two ways to deploy critical business applications: highly customized deployments that take too long, or proprietary stacks of applications and infrastructure that are inherently rigid and slow to change. The result is only 32 percent of IT projects that deliver critical business applications are rated as "successful" by the organizations implementing them(2).

Delivering on the companies' extended partnership announceda year ago, the new converged application appliances from HP and Microsoft are the industry's first systems designed for IT as well as end users. They deliver application services such as business intelligence, data warehousing, online transaction processing and messaging. The jointly engineered appliances, and related consulting and support services, enable IT to deliver critical business applications in as little as one hour, compared with potentially months needed for traditional systems.(3) One of the solutions already offered by HP and Microsoft - the HP Enterprise Data Warehouse Appliance - delivers up to 200 times faster queries and 10 times the scalability of traditional SQL Server deployments.(4)

"Customers are looking to significantly reduce implementation and decision times," said Santanu Ghose, Country Head,Converged Infrastructure Solutions, HP India."With our converged application appliances, HP and Microsoft enable customers to shorten the time required to deliver information, which helps to reduce risk and cost."

"Microsoft and HP are helping IT professionals fight their biggest foes - time and complexity," said Jitesh Shetty, Director - Enterprise Partnership and Industry Solutions, Microsoft India "With these appliances, we're helping to put critical business information in our customers' hands when they need it."

Expanding the reach of business intelligence
With the HP Business Decision Appliance , HP and Microsoft have greatly reduced the time and effort it takes for IT to configure, deploy and manage a comprehensive business intelligence solution, compared with a traditional business intelligence solution where applications, infrastructure and productivity tools are not pre-integrated. This appliance is optimized for Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft SharePoint and can be installed and configured by IT in less than one hour.

The solution enables end users to share data analyses built with Microsoft's award-winning(5) PowerPivot add-in for Microsoft Excel and collaborate with others in SharePoint 2010. It allows IT to centrally audit, monitor and manage solutions created by end users from a single dashboard.

Red Wing Shoe Company, a worldwide manufacturer and retailer of premium work shoes and boots, was an early adopter of the HP Business Decision Appliance through GNet, an HP/Microsoft Frontline channel partner.

"We were intrigued by the idea that we could implement a turnkey solution that was fully integrated into our environment with minimal effort," said Mike Cleary, director, IT Architecture and Operations, Red Wing Shoe Company. "Previously, to install all the required software and configure the components would have taken us several days. Now, not only our business analysts but the broader user community can use a familiar tool, Microsoft Excel, to create and analyze data in new and unique ways."

Scalable from midsized organizations to large enterprise environments, converged application appliances also offer HP/Microsoft Frontline channel partners like GNet significant sales opportunities. Because the appliances are open, based on industry-standards and can be integrated into heterogeneous data centers, they are ideal offerings for channel partners.

The HP Business Data Warehouse Appliance is a data store designed for small and midsize businesses that delivers enterprise-class functionality with increased simplicity and administrator-free operation. This appliance complements the HP Enterprise Data Warehouse Appliance, which is designed for large organizations, optimized for SQL Server 2008 R2 and was introduced in November . The HP Enterprise Data Warehouse Appliance improves data access with massive scalability and faster queries than traditional SQL Server databases. Through interoperability with the Microsoft Business Intelligence platform, customers can deliver managed business intelligence solutions to everyone in an organization.

Enterprise-class messaging in hours
The new HP E5000 Messaging System for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 is the industry's first self-contained, pre-configured platform for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 that delivers enterprise-class messaging to businesses of all sizes. This messaging system, which can be deployed in as little as a few hours, delivers large mailboxes at a low cost, centralized archiving and 24/7 access from any device, and it can scale as business needs grow.

Customers benefit from built-in features such as the HP Quick Deployment tool, which validates configuration and active directory permissions to enable faster implementation. In addition, compatibility between management tools such as HP Systems Insight Manager and Microsoft System Center Operations Manager, as well as support, help reduce the amount of time required to implement the solution.

To help ensure uninterrupted service, the appliance features designed-in best practices with fully redundant hardware and Database Availability Groups, a Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 feature that continuously replicates data.

Delivering on the promise of private clouds
In addition to workload-specific appliances, HP and Microsoft plan to deliver the HP Database Consolidation Appliance. This appliance consolidates hundreds of databases into a single, virtual environment, providing customers with a private cloud database solution that offers self-service, on-demand scalability and dynamic elasticity with the additional control offered through an on-premises deployment.

Optimized for SQL Server 2008 R2 and Microsoft Hyper-V Cloud, the appliance will be delivered as complete, pre-installed, pre-tuned hardware with rapid deployment and enhanced manageability. Similar capabilities of the appliance will be offered as a reference architecture to customers who have advanced IT skills and prefer to build their own appliance with best practice guidance from HP and Microsoft.

Accelerating business service delivery
HP and Microsoft will offer support and consulting services for the converged application appliances to help customers accelerate business service delivery. The services portfolios include assessment, design, proof of concept and implementation, as well as ongoing support. The services use HP and Microsoft's expertise in delivering comprehensive, simplified solutions for data management, business intelligence, data warehouse and messaging.

More information about the HP and Microsoft agreement is available at http://www.hp.com/go/convergedapplicationsolutions/microsoftor http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/en/us/solutions-technologies/appliances.aspx.

About Microsoft India:

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (NASDAQ "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software - any time, any place and on any device. Microsoft Corporation (India) Private Ltd is a subsidiary of Microsoft Corporation, USA. It has had a presence in India since 1990 and currently has offices in 13 cities - Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Indore, Jaipur, Kochi, Kolkata, Mumbai, New Delhi and Pune.

About HP

HP creates new possibilities for technology to have a meaningful impact on people, businesses, governments and society. The world's largest technology company, HP brings together a portfolio that spans printing, personal computing, software, services and IT infrastructure to solve customer problems. More information about HP (NYSE: HPQ) is available at http://www.hp.com .

(1) Based on HP research, this is the first appliances portfolio to optimize employee productivity and reduce IT complexity.
(2) CHAOS Summary 2009, Jim Johnson, Standish Group, April 2009.
(3) Based on HP's experience with customers using HP Business Decision Appliance.
(4) SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse (PDW) has been evaluated by 16 early adopter customers in six different industries. Customers compared PDW with their existing environments and saw typically 40x and up to 200x improvement in query times.
(5) Messaging and Online Collaboration Reviews, Nov. 30, 2010, eWEEK.com.

This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions. If such risks or uncertainties materialize or such assumptions prove incorrect, the results of HP and its consolidated subsidiaries could differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements and assumptions. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements, including but not limited to statements of the plans, strategies and objectives of management for future operations; any statements concerning expected development, performance or market share relating to products and services; any statements regarding anticipated operational and financial results; any statements of expectation or belief; and any statements of assumptions underlying any of the foregoing. Risks, uncertainties and assumptions include macroeconomic and geopolitical trends and events; the competitive pressures faced by HP's businesses; the development and transition of new products and services (and the enhancement of existing products and services) to meet customer needs and respond to emerging technological trends; the execution and performance of contracts by HP and its customers, suppliers and partners; the achievement of expected operational and financial results; and other risks that are described in HP's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including but not limited to HP's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended October 31, 2010. HP assumes no obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements.

© 2011 Hewlett-Packard Asia Pacific Pte Ltd. Registration No.: 198703164G. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.


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CONTACT DETAILS
Laureen C. Momin, Text 100, +91 9999010098, laureenm@text100.co.in
Tushar Makkar, Microsoft India, tmakkar@microsoft.com
Jayshri Goswami, Genesis Burson-Marsteller, +91 9986362433, Jayshri.goswaim@bm.com
Aravind Vasudevan, HP India, +91 9900157827, aravind.vasudevan@hp.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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