KitGuru recently reported on how Computercenter, one of the world's biggest HP customers, had shunned HP Blade servers for its own data centres. Instead, Computercenter chose newcomer Cisco. Looks like things might be about to get a whole lot worse for HP.
As HP is fond of saying, maybe this is the start of something exceptional.
Normally, a brand recognition poll for HP and Cisco would line these companies up with printers and routers respectively.
Cisco winning Computercenter's Blade business means that it's now successfully positioning itself as HP's main competitor in the serious server space.
That market is massive.
It's highly profitable.
It allows big companies to use the classis IBM approach of selling lots of tin at sensible margins to enable the sale of tons of services at sky-high margins.
But there is a catch. Just because experts like Computercenter can see why Cisco's UCS Blade offering (Unified Computing Solution) is better than HP's, that doesn't mean that mortal IT Directors and CTOs will go anywhere near the product.
To see how the market, overall, will respond – you need a poll. And that's just what CRN has deployed over at Incisive Media.
Taking no chances, Cisco is commissioning white papers on its superiority to HP like there is no tomorrow.
KitGuru says: Once upon a time, there was a company called Compaq that ruled the server market like no one else. With ProLiant and ProSignia server top of everyone's list, no one ever imagined a world without Compaq. Then Carly's HP bought the biggest server brand on the planet and, within a couple of years, it was being used to make HP's weakest laptop range look ‘a little less crap'. Cisco's brand is 100% about quality. No one on the planet can argue with Cisco about its credentials. We're just wondering how much of a hit HP's share price will take over the next 24 months.
Drop your packets below or use some point to point tunnelling protocols to get to the KitGuru forum and hit us in burst mode.
handbags at dawn 🙂
While there is no doubt that Cisco has a good offering, stating that Cisco will overpower HP in the blade server marketplace is simple preposterous. In my opinion, Cisco’s offering is ideal for Enterprise environments but is overkill for the small to medium space. When you look at IDC’s 2Q 2010 press release on blade server market share (http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS22360110) Cisco is not even on the map. I predict Cisco is 2 – 3 years away from becoming anywhere close to competing in market share with HP or IBM. Just my two cents…
And Gartner Said ATM would win over Ethernet and Voice over IP is a Fad. I think I’ll trust Cisco’s vision better. Cisco is onto something and all the other alphabet players in the server market better watch out- Virtualizaiton/Cloud = Refresh, Refresh= UCS