Remember that old fairy tale called Jack and the Beanstalk? Some magical beans grew a giant vine reaching all the way up to the clouds where great rewards and even greater dangers awaited our unsuspecting hero. Many enterprises may feel the same way about moving to the cloud. Sure, there are promised rewards—but how to minimize those giant risks?
Chances are you are already doing virtualization today, and probably using VMware vSphere. Virtualization is a great step in expanding and optimizing the computational power of your physical machines. Consider that planting those magic beans. But it’s only part of the story. Smart CIOs and IT directors know even more CAPEX savings and OPEX efficiencies can be had by expanding virtualization to other areas of their data centers - namely storage and networking. Running a software defined data center gives you greater savings, better efficiencies, and more security, and is a great step towards expanding into the cloud.
