By samdizzy

HP_cloud

In an interview with The New York Times, Hewlett-Packard made it clear that the company wants to leverage open standards (Ruby, Java, PHP) to attract software developers onto its cloud platform.

Most folks are comparing the HP public cloud strategy to that of Amazon Web Services. But in my mind, HP is more likely to collide with Microsoft Windows Azure — which also leverages a range of open standards. Plus, HP wants to promote data management and analytics in its public cloud. To me, that sounds a bit like SQL Azure.

HP and Microsoft: Partnering and Competing

Now for the irony: Hewlett-Packard is one of Microsoft’s most trusted, longest-standing server application partners. HP was one of the first promoters of Windows NT Server back in the 1990s, and HP remains one of the largest corporate integrators of Exchange Server. On premise, it’s clear Microsoft and HP will continue to partner closely. But in the cloud, it’s clear Microsoft and HP will both partner and compete — the latest example of so-called IT “coopetition.”

HP will need to recruit developers to embrace its public cloud efforts. That’s a tall challenge considering HP doesn’t have much history in the ISV (independent software vendor) market. But perhaps HP’s buyout of Autonomy can assist that effort. And in the SMB market, HP has been working with such companies as Axcient — a backup and disaster recovery specialist — in the cloud.

Windows Azure Cloud Update

Meanwhile, I think Microsoft is off to a mixed — though promising — start with Windows Azure and SQL Azure. The company suffered an embarrassing leap year cloud meltdown on February 29, but there are signs that channel-related solutions are shifting into the Azure cloud. Two examples include Quosal (a quoting and sales proposal tool for VARs and MSPs) and CA ARCserve (the backup platform for channel partners), both of which now leverage Azure.

Admittedly, I could be jumping the gun comparing HP’s public cloud strategy to that of Windows Azure. HP hasn’t even officially “announced” its public cloud initiative. But by mentioning a standards-based ISV effort in that New York times article, I think HP has Windows Azure on its radar…