GigaOm Research held a webinar on IT infrastructure marketplaces and the impact of utility computing. Paul Miller moderated a panel that included:
David Linthicum, SVP at Cloud Technology Partners
Jo Maitland, Cloud Research Director, GigaOm
Rob Bissett, VP Product Management, 6fusion
It was an open dialogue that covered a range of topics in the emerging arena of IaaS marketplaces, including:
Why do we need a market for IaaS?
How markets succeed… and fail
Comparing apples, oranges, and straight bananas
How do we get there?
MuleSoft Online Meetup Group - B2B Crash Course: Release SparkNotes
Giga om 6fusion webinar iaas marketplaces - final for slideshare
1. View a recording of this webinar at:
http://www.6fusion.com/2013/05/24/iaas-marketplaces-the-impact-of-utility-c
2. Agenda for today’s webinar
• Introductions
• A message from 6fusion
• Why do we need a market for IaaS?
• How markets succeed… and fail
• Apples, oranges, and straight bananas
• How do we get there?
• Q&A
3. Today’s moderator and panelists
Paul Miller – GigaOM Research Analyst &
Founder, Cloud of Data
David Linthicum – GigaOM Research Analyst
& SVP, Cloud Technology Partners
Jo Maitland – Research Director, Cloud,
GigaOM Research
Rob Bissett – VP of Product Management,
6fusion
4. 6fusion – Corporate Overview
• Global Headquarters: Raleigh, NC
• Company Background:
– 2003 - VMware practice within MSP
– 2008 – IP spun off & incorporated
• Investors: Intersouth Partners & Grotech Ventures
– $14M raised to date
www.6fusion.com
“This ability to compare and contrast the true cost and value of different
computing solutions is a compelling piece of utility computing’s
promise. Assigning a single metric (such as 6fusion’s WAC) to
available computing resources and different tasks means that
accurately managing resources and considering the cost of
competing solutions is possible.”
Source: GigaOM October 2012; Metered IT: the path to utility computing
5. Connecting IT Infrastructure Buyers and Sellers
Infrastructure
Marketplace
IT Operations
Supplier 6
Supplier 5
Supplier 4
Supplier 3
Supplier 2
Supplier 1
Billing
Reporting
Provisioning
Tagging
Metering
Integration
6fusion’s
SaaS platform connects
buyers and sellers
of IT infrastructure
https://console.6fusion.com
METERING
6. Why do we need a market for IaaS?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/19478438@N00/2301640973/
7. Why do we need a market for IaaS?
• Doesn’t basic price competition between
providers like Amazon, Rackspace and Google
effectively give us a market today?
• What do providers gain from something more
structured?
• What do customers gain from something more
structured?
• Do any of these markets exist today?
8. How markets succeed… and fail
http://www.flickr.com/photos/49749040@N04/6191480170/
9. How markets succeed… and fail
• How do other markets and exchanges work?
– Supply & demand
– A shared concept of the unit of trade
– Scale
– Regulation?
– Friction?
• Futures and Hedges and Shorts… and
Speculation
– Are these an essential part of a market or an added benefit?
– How might they work for compute resources?
11. Apples, oranges, and straight bananas
• How essential is a shared method of
measurement?
– 6fusion’s Workload Allocation Cube (WAC), etc
– How many shared methods of measurement can a single market
support?
– Could different markets use different measurements?
– How do we measure the right things, the right way?
– A ton (or tonne!) of coal is obviously and tangibly a ton (or tonne) of
coal. What is a gigaom of compute, and can I check it before I consume
it?
– Do we need a shared unit of compute? What would that even mean?
12. How do we get there?
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cosmographia_Northern_Europe_1482.jpg
13. How do we get there?
• How do we get from our current state to a future
in which compute is routinely and
understandably bought and sold?
• How many exchanges are interested or needed?
• How many vendors are interested or needed?
• How much consensus is there on models?
• How many customers do we need to be viable, and what does
their demand have to look like?
• Will it work without Amazon?
• How long will this take?
• Will anything be better, or will a few traders just make some
money?
6fusion is built “from the metering technology out” First provider to figure this out – key differentiator Makes it possible to assemble and deliver massively scalable IaaS 6fusion’s platform architecture is highly centralized and hardware/hypervisor agnostic Makes true hybrid use possible Allows for global distribution of workloads Removes hardware/hypervisor vendor lock-in risk 6fusion’s Workload Allocation Cube Makes it inherently possible to quantify supply and demand of compute, the basis of: Migration planning Operational cost allocation Cost performance benchmarking 6fusion’s platform is based on REST API Makes the UI fully customizable Allows for modular integration of 6fusion tools with third party (Bank) applications