HP Launches Public Cloud Reseller Program, Touts OpenStack

By samdizzy

Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) launched new HP Public Cloud partner program initiatives today and also offered updates on OpenStack performance and HP CloudSystem sales. Those pieces of news surfaced at HP Global Partner Conference 2013 in Las Vegas.

HP CloudSystem is now running in more than 120 cloud data centers worldwide, according to Executive VP Dave Donatelli. He mentioned that CloudSystem now has more than 900 customers, and sales of the solution are growing more than 100 percent year over year. 

The CloudSystem has two partner opportunities:

Cloud Reseller Partner Program

Meanwhile, HP is launching new partner program components for its public cloud.

Dan Baigent, senior director of business development, HP Cloud Services, said the HP Cloud Builder Program gains public cloud capabilities. This allows partners to refer and resell HP Public Cloud services to customers. It's an annuity-based partner program. Global systems integrators can also get training while ramping up consulting services for customers. He didn't mention specific margin opportunities.

Baigent said the cloud reseller partner progam will come out in three stages:

Also, there are new HP Cloud Load Balancing, Monitoring as a Service and DNS as a service offerings for partners and customers.

Still, HP Public Cloud is OpenStack, an open source cloud platform that some critics think needs more time to mature. 

Baigent, however, pointed to OpenStack's progress and HP's leadership: "We [HP] are the ones who have moved the needle forward in terms of reliability and stabililty. But it's an ecosystem. We believe that's what makes the community robust — multiple contributors to push this forward. We wouldn't have launched our service and offered an SLA if it OpenStack] wasn't ready."

Al Chien, VP, sales and marketing, Dasher, said he has an installed base of customers that are asking about moving workloads between private, hybrid and public clouds. Dasher plans to leverage the HP relationship as those opportunities pop up.

For complete coverage of HP GPC check out Talkin' Cloud's sister website: The VAR Guy.

HP Cloud Service Provider Partners: CloudAgile

A panel included:

CloudAgile partners basically build their cloud solutions atop HP hardware. Axcient, for instance, runs its cloud storage and business continuity atop HP's hardware. Both Axcient and Latisys have their own partner programs. Simac does not have a partner program but is getting inquiries and listening to feedback about that potential path. 

It sounds like HP has attracted roughly 80-plus CloudAgile partners so far.