New HP releases confirm utility computing future

OpenView software boosts plans for pay-as-you-go technology

HP has extended its plans for providing utility computing services with the release of new software for its OpenView systems management tools.

The vendor sees the development of pay-as-you-go technology as an important part of its future, and announced a series of products at its Software Universe event in Lisbon.

New releases include version 6.4 of OpenView Network Node Manager and version 2 of Network Node Manager Extended Topology, which give businesses more power to predict network problems and to investigate their root causes.

HP is pushing OpenView as the building block for utility computing, along with its Utility Data Centre (UDC), which allows resources to be more easily shared, reallocated and remotely managed across networks.

'Utility computing will happen. Talk to any chief information officer and the biggest challenge that keeps them awake at night is the management of the environment,' said Peter Blackmore, worldwide head of HP's enterprise systems group.

Rival IBM unveiled a $10bn investment in its 'ebusiness on demand' utility computing strategy earlier this month (Computing/I>, 14 November). The announcements are part of an emerging trend to able to provide processing power across a network and pay for it in the same way as electricity or telephony.

Will Cappelli, research fellow at analyst Giga Information Group, says HP is ahead of IBM in delivering utility computing technology.

'HP has a hard product - they have a first draft, whereas IBM has just got a blueprint,' he said.

Over the next 18 months, HP says it will release further utility computing products, including technologies that allow virtual aggregation of network resources and better support for business processes, service management, and service level agreements.

Andr‚ Spatz, chief information officer of United Nations children's fund Unicef, runs networks across more than 160 countries. He says HP's announcements are important for organisations with worldwide operations.

'It's a logical progression and will be useful for us,' he said. 'What is encouraging is that HP is pushing IT services management and the idea of adaptive systems. This is good news for someone like us, whose computing infrastructure has to be truly global.'