The Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP) 4.0 release makes significant enhances to Hitachi UCP Advisor, and adds important new SAP and VMware certifications.
Paul Lewis, Chief Technology Officer, at Hitachi Vantara
Today, storage vendor Hitachi Vantara is announcing new enhancements and capabilities to its hyperconverged infrastructure [HCI] portfolio, impacting the Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP) 4.0 release, impacting HCP UCP HC and Hitachi UCP RS. The changes include an enhanced Hitachi UCP Advisor, scalability through new support for SAP HANA Workloads and for the newest Intel Cascade Lake Xenon processors, and new HCI bundles for channel partners.
A common theme running through all the enhancements is increasing automation and scalability for the hybrid cloud, to permit rapid scale out of data centre architecture designs to meet increased resource demand.
“It all integrates with existing infrastructure to enable workload mobility, and allows customers to maximize IT investment,” said Patricia Harris, Vice President, Marketing, Digital Infrastructure at Hitachi Vantara. “The new Hitachi UCP will run more workloads faster, with purpose-built HCI for latency-critical applications.”
The enhancements begin with improvements to Hitachi UCP Advisor to provide unified cloud management.
“We have updated it to allow you to manage all the parts of the UCP portfolio,” said Paul Lewis, Chief Technology Officer, at Hitachi Vantara. “You now have automation across all those platforms, including the underlying storage portfolio itself. It’s the automation that is the key. It lets us bring up workflows and resources 80% faster than before.”
“The new UCP Advisor also simplifies IT management, providing intelligent automation and expansion without boundaries,” Harris noted.
“UCP Advisor provides lifecycle management for the full HCI stack and automates management of hybrid cloud infrastructure,” said Colin Gallagher, Hitachi Vantara’s VP Product Marketing, Digital Infrastructure.
Scalability is enhanced in UCP 4.0 with the addition of certified support for SAP HANA workloads
“We are one of the first vendors to have certified support for HANA workloads,” Lewis said, indicating that they are in fact the second. “SAP is traditionally scale up and with this it is a scale out, and we have the infrastructure to support that.”
Gallagher emphasized this is important because of the increasing importance SAP is attaching to HANA.
“SAP HANA workload certification enables handling of mission-critical apps,” he said. “SAP is driving customers using other SAP products to HANA. You can now be future proofed with HANA on our UCP HCI.”
Scalability has also been enhanced by new Intel Cascade Lake Refresh Xeon processors, which will increase performance for workload consolidation while avoiding resource contention issues.
“This is also the first Intel-certified HCI for VMware Horizon,” Gallagher noted. “That’s incredibly important as customers look to increase remote office capabilities, as this lets them stand up VDI experience in hours. You can now deploy VMware SDDC on our HCI or SAN, and we are one of the first solutions to deploy HCI hybrid cloud with vVols or SDDC.”
Harris emphasized the importance of Hitachi Vantara’s Everflex consumption model with this release. EverFlex is newish, but not new. It was introduced in April.
“What is different now is that while we initially talked about it more from a flexibility and choice perspective, we are now also talking about it from an agility and project allocation perspective,” Lewis said. “The agility is important in relating to all these waves of change we are seeing now. change related – to these waves of change.”
New bundles around the Hitachi Vantara UCP are also part of the package.
“These new bundles available to the channel involve both services and product, and have recently deployed into the partner portal, and allows you to deliver these faster,” Lewis said.
“Our partners will be very well equipped now with a very competitive solution with more flexibility, both for large enterprise and midsize enterprise scenarios,” Harris said. “It’s a straightforward approach for mission-critical solutions.”
“The new UCP is very important for our channel because it lets them deliver streamlined solutions that drives additional value for partners,” Gallagher said “They now get to leverage our investment and skills in VMware and deliver an improved Cloud Foundation experience.
“Our enhanced lifecycle management will also help partners deliver services,” Gallagher added. “HCI solutions often have a lot of plumbing around management.”
Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC and Hitachi Unified Compute Platform RS are available now.
