Converged infrastructure integrates discrete components, such as compute and storage, along with orchestration software, into a package that’s simple to deploy and certified to interoperate. Join Chris Wahl, Ethan Banks, and special guest Stu Miniman as they drill into the origins and benefits of converged infrastructure, how it differentiates from hyperconverged systems, and how the convergence trend will affect IT roles.

Stu notes that converged infrastructure is a mature technology, but adoption is still in the early stages; perhaps a $6 to $8 billion market vs. the trillion dollars that gets spent on servers and storage. But future growth will eat into sales of standalone infrastructure.

Convergence also means smart IT pros will broaden their skill sets and get familiar with one or two elements of the stack outside their own area of expertise; a working knowledge of virtualization and the application layer are good places to start. IT workers whose primary work is racking, stacking, and configuring gear should look for new roles.

Convergence leaders include VCE, Cisco with its UCS line, and Oracle, which has built a hardware stack designed to simplify the delivery of its applications. If you’re exploring the converged infrastructure, these companies should be on your shortlist. NetApp, HP, and IBM are also worth investigating.

Check out the full podcast and let us know what other topics you’d like to hear.

About Our Guest

Stu Miniman

* Senior Analyst at Wikibon

* Twitter: @stu

* Stu’s Articles at Wikibon