Competition is heating up in the network virtualization space

Network administrators may take an easy breath. After building various components for the virtual world and thereafter helping to increase their speed and capacity, the giants in network world, seem to be focusing on easing the life of network administrators. This news will come as a relief for the 'always on toes' guys running all over the place solving all sorts of network problems faced by their users.

The apparent solution seems to the concept called as 'network virtualization', which means nothing but to divide the available bandwidth into independent channels, isolated from each other. Later these channels can be dynamically assigned to servers or devices in the real time. A network subscriber with the right authentication and privileges can access the network from his system. This helps the network administrators to virtually manage the storage media as they can be dynamically assigned and share the storage space efficiently among various servers. This may not be of help to small set ups or the places where the network load is constant over a period of time and there are no regular upsurges in the usage. But if you are talking about irregular network load and incessant network traffic or various storage media coming in and out of systems at the whim of users, you need to think of virtualizing the network making it leaner and more manageable.

By definition Network virtualization (NV) is using network resources through a logical segmentation of a single physical network. Network virtualization is achieved by installing software and services to manage the sharing of storage, computing cycles and applications. Network virtualization treats all servers and services in the network as a single pool of resources that can be accessed without regard for its physical components. The term network virtualization is often used to describe many things including network management, storage virtualization, and even grid computing. (Source: Wikipedia). There are various approaches for virtualization and the virtualized network may have different sets of network components or various types of network in them. So generally the virtual network may consist of Network hardware, such as switches and network adapters, networks, such as virtual LANs (VLANs) and containers such as virtual machines (VMs) and Solaris Servers. It may also have various network storage devices and media. (Source: Wikipedia).

Considering the complexity of managing networks and the investment that is involved in setting up a complete network, it makes a great business case for the companies to look at avenues of saving costs that bring more efficiency at the same time. It seems that Juniper has taken this approach when the company outlined its new "3-2-1" data center network architecture aimed at improving latency, increasing density, boosting security, lowering power requirement and simplifying management.

As per the overall understanding of Datacenter goes, they have access, aggregation and core switching layers. Juniper currently clubs the aggregation and core layers into a single switch. The Virtual Chassis creates a single, logical switching fabric across multiple racks in the data center. By this approach Juniper aims to let the administrators move virtual machines between 10x faster than current approaches. The company is also introducing EX4500 switch designed for top-of-rack data center access, and the EX8200-40 SX line card that can be inserted into the company's EX8200 chassis to enable up to 640 ports of 10 GigE in a single box. On the software front, the company is seeking to drive simplification through a single network OS (Junos), single software release chain, and flexible software platforms (Junos, Junos Space and Junos Pulse).

But they are not the only one there. In a press release issued on 19th of May 2010, SAP announced a partnership with the Cisco-EMC-VMware Virtual Computing Environment (VCE) coalition and it is testing application deployments on the VCE's Vblock virtualization infrastructure. The Vblock infrastructure combines computing, network, storage, security, management and virtualization technologies from Cisco, EMC and VMWare. As it is claimed, the Vblock will help customers deliver shared services through private clouds, according to SAP.

There might be many more such coalitions and product introductions taking place in the market to gain the maximum customer footprint. So for the network administrators looking for easing their hectic schedules, keep your eyes open. Your ideal solution may be just around the corner!

Ted Black
Senior Solution Architect
Global IT Networks Ltd
Tel.: +91 20 32345349 \ 86
Mobile: +91 98813 03682
Website: www(dot)globalitnetworks(dot)com

Why buy Refurbished Networking Hardware?

Global IT Networks has been in the hardware business for nearly a decade now. Using this market experience we have put efforts to understand the various aspects that motivate customers to opt for refurbished/pre-owned/used networking hardware. Our UK Director Serge has observed that it is not just the price that motivates companies, there are other factors that contribute greatly while making this decision. He mentioned that in some cases organizations go for refurbished products because they want to, not because they are compelled to.

I tried to extend this thought and jotted down 3 points that I feel are important factors that our customers think of:


Price- As I mentioned earlier, price is an important factor. IT infrastructure costs can burn a hole in an organizations pocket if not done tactfully. Most of our customers have agreed that they split their needs as per their budget- the products which form a non-critical part are most likely bought in refurbished condition. An organization can save up to 70% of their revamp costs by opting for refurbished.

Availability- A major problem that most companies face in procuring IT hardware is of meeting deadlines. As a thumb rule, suppliers all over the world mention a lead time of 4 weeks in most quotes they provide. This causes an inconvenience when the requirement is urgent (most of them are!). While talking with our customers I realized that non-availability of particular brand new products makes IT Managers opt for refurbished hardware. We at Global IT Networks, provide refurbished products of Cisco, Nortel, Sun, Cabletron, 3Com, Juniper, Extreme, Lucent, Avaya, IBM and HP within a few days.

Quality Assurance- Refurbished hardware by definition warrants a certification of the product quality from the reseller. That being said, most tech-savvy organizations have started realizing the true merits of refurbished hardware. A close friend of mine who is an IT Manager in a software firm told me that all his vendors provide quality products. Global IT Networks has a testing facility where our engineers test the components for their performance. In case of any problem we also provide a replacement warranty of one year.


Umesh Kulkarni
Director-Sales
Global IT Networks
http://www.globalitnetworks.in/

Hardware resale industry’s growth in recent years

As long as I can remember, buying ‘used’ or ‘secondhand’ was always frowned upon as it was considered synonymous to ‘not working’. It was also assumed that a used product will be of inferior quality. There are even a lot of horror stories of organizations being ripped of by people selling inferior quality products and passing them off as refurbished.

However, in recent years the general outlook towards the reselling industry has changed. Organizations look at used networking equipment not only as a cost saving option but also a means to join the green revolution. We identify below reasons that have helped this change:

1) Cost:
Cost being the driving factor for organizations to invest in technology, used or refurbished networking hardware is where they can actually save money. Opting for used hardware companies can reduce their IT costs up to 90%. Buying used routers or switches can save the company thousands of dollars.

2) Ever increasing Quality:
Many online hardware resellers are gaining reputation for excellent customer service, better buy back offers and unbelievable discounts. And it is not unfounded. With the products getting better, the resellers are getting better products to offer.

3) Green Revolution:
Almost all the Fortune 500 companies are investing the greener technologies and promising ecofriendly business practices. A part of which is recycling used hardware and finding use of these equipments. Reusing network equipments avoids the scrapping of hardware.

4) Ready Availability:
Typically, brand new hardware has a lead time of months, as opposed to a couple of days in the case of used hardware. With huge stock holding most resellers are offering services like instant quote and immediate delivery upon confirmation. Global IT Networks has an extensive inventory in its two warehouses.

5) Customer Service:
Resellers are all over are switching to developed work processes to provide the customer better support. This includes offering best discounts, assuring quality products, arranging after sales support and respecting customer deadlines.

Umesh Kulkarni

Direct-Sales

Global IT Networks

http://www.globalitnetworks.in/

Cost cutting on IT Infrastructure

The recent economic downturn has made all IT companies think hard about their costs and so most IT managers are coming up with cost saving proposals. IT hardware sales too have seen a dip in profits and most IT companies are looking to cut costs. The manufacturing sector too has on an average reduced their expenditure on IT hardware in the last couple of quarters.

That being said, things in the networking hardware business have started to look better. With increased profitability, business houses are again looking forward to an IT infrastructure revamp. In the recent pasts our clients too have approached us with orders demanding very competitive pricing on the routers switches and other networking paraphernalia.

This has made Global IT Networks realize the true potential of our experience in the networking hardware business. We are in a unique position to offer our customers the best discounts on listed products- be it used or brand new.

Umesh Kulkarni

Director-Sales

http://www.globalitnetworks.in/