During the program, ATS contributed its expertise to help replicate on-premises solution stacks on AWS infrastructure. The company also performed POC solutions for customers eagerly waiting for IBM to officially release IBM Spectrum Virtualize for Public Cloud software on AWS, garnering insights into how to build its own offerings around the product.
“As we went through the beta program, we saw how the solution works, how easy it is to use, because we’re experts in it, but at face value it looks complicated,” explains Conley. “We saw our ability to bridge the gap for people who wouldn’t know what it was and how to use it. We saw our ability to do something unique.”
To simplify solution adoption and management, ATS developed two offerings based on IBM Spectrum Virtualize for Public Cloud on AWS, a licensed software product from IBM now available through the AWS Marketplace for a flat, capacity-based price:
- A comprehensive managed services solution, including purchase of IBM and Amazon licenses, installation and configuration, data migration and ongoing management, for a monthly fee
- Consulting services, including solution installation, configuration and migration, for a one-time consulting fee
These offerings enable customers to connect with ATS specialists who have extensive experience in both IBM and AWS platforms. “You’ve got to understand both sides of the fence to actually do these implementations, and that’s one of the big values we bring to customers,” emphasizes Conley.
ATS also adds measurable value by accurately calculating capacity and performance requirements for each customer’s IBM Spectrum Virtualize for Public Cloud on AWS installation, built on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud instances with Amazon Elastic Block Storage volumes. Using its Galileo Performance Explorer solution, ATS can appropriately size an installation at initial deployment, potentially resulting in huge savings.
Whether on IBM Cloud or AWS, IBM Spectrum Virtualize for Public Cloud provides true hybrid multicloud data mobility for business continuity and workload mobility. Enterprises can improve performance and optimize public cloud infrastructure, while also extending their current on-premises investments to the public cloud.
Designed to connect to environments that use the IBM SAN Volume Controller and IBM FlashSystem® products , IBM Spectrum Virtualize for Public Cloud also integrates with more than 450 additional storage systems from IBM and other vendors when virtualized by IBM storage. A common set of all-inclusive features and services streamlines management across storage resources while helping ensure data protection between private and public clouds. In particular, thin provisioned volumes, space-efficient snapshots and IBM EasyTier® automated, intelligent tiering help reduce TCO associated with on-premises and cloud infrastructure as a service (IaaS) storage, including Amazon Elastic Block Storage volumes. “We can move data up and down between higher cost storage to lower cost storage. No other cloud vendor offers that capability,” says Conley.