Announcing VMware Cloud on AWS Integration With Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP

This article was written by Phil Brotherton, Vice President of NetApp's Solutions and Alliances program.

We're excited to announce the availability of the VMware Cloud on AWS integration with Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP. Yes, it's a bit of mouthful, but each element of the offering is essential—two's company and three is definitely a cloud with this big announcement.

This built-from-the-ground-up offering is the only integrated, certified, and supported external NFS datastore for VMware Cloud on AWS. For the first time, compute and storage are independent in the cloud with an integrated solution built on NetApp® ONTAP® storage software managed by the AWS Management Console.

Migrating and running VMware in the cloud has never been easier — or more cost-effective.

Decoupling storage and compute

Data storage can be the squeaky wheel when you're migrating enterprise applications to the cloud, especially VMware workloads. Because these applications have commonly required significantly more storage than CPU and memory, cloud adopters tend to purchase more nodes than needed. Scalability, yes; cost savings, maybe.

When building out on-premises IT infrastructures in the past, it's been very common to overcompensate and buy the storage infrastructure needed way down the road, not the one needed today.

Cloud computing turned "overcapacity as a practice" on its head. The whole point of cloud is to buy only what you need—to have elasticity in demand and usage and pay accordingly. But when it came to hybrid cloud investments for storage-capacity-skewed workloads—such as big data and AI—in virtualized environments, overcapacity and underutilization could blow up your TCO.

Three's a cloud

NetApp and VMware have a 20-year history of cooperation and innovation together for 20,000 customers. Both companies have committed to building integrated, certified, and supported solutions for customers using AWS. This announcement continues the commitment to solving challenges and encouraging hybrid cloud transformations.

"Organizations across all industries rely on the combination of VMware and NetApp as the platform of choice for delivering business-critical workloads. NetApp is now able to deliver the same levels of enterprise-class data management that our mutual customers have enjoyed for decades on premises to workloads running in any of the major public clouds," said Narayan Bharadwaj, vice president of Cloud Solutions at VMware.

Jointly engineered by VMware and AWS, the VMware Cloud on AWS integration with Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP is an external NFS datastore that can be attached to VMware Cloud on AWS vSphere clusters.

You can now scale the storage environment as needed without having to purchase more host instances. The solution is built directly into the service that's managed as part of the AWS Management Console. And because the technology is NetApp ONTAP, the processes, services, and IT talent you already use in your on-premises environments can be leveraged in the cloud.

Scalability, yes; cost savings, absolutely.

Cost savings and manageability

The savings are significant. We estimate that the cost of running VMware Cloud services can be reduced up to 25% to 50%, depending on configuration. Your initial upfront costs for purchasing instances on AWS would decrease drastically, and any expanded capacity needed later would also generate savings. We've effectively eliminated the last barriers to migration.

If you're looking to consolidate a data center and move to hybrid cloud, we also estimate a 25% to 50% lower TCO for these types of projects. Now you have the flexibility to scale storage to handle any type of workload as the workload demands—not your budget.

There's a huge management benefit, too. This offering makes it easier to do the day-to-day data management that enterprise workloads need. Creating snap copies and clones, and providing data protection, privacy, and compliance documentation—all the necessary tasks are now available in the VMware Cloud on AWS service through ONTAP. With simplified data management and use of existing storage design and skillsets, migration is easier.

That means better application performance and response, greater resilience and higher availability, and an improvement in your business's bottom line.

Get started

We know that there have been obstacles to wider cloud adoption. But at NetApp, we've been constantly at work with our cloud partners—including AWS—to remove those obstacles and deliver services that support your digital transformations. This team has recognized your pain and done something about it.

The basic demand for migrating workloads to the cloud is economics and ease. The decoupling of compute and storage makes the economics clear. With the ONTAP software you know and love built right into the VMware Cloud on AWS, the ease of migration is clear, too.

The wait is over, and the solution is a truly viable, affordable, high-performance option for enterprise workloads. Test out this solution for yourself in our on-demand lab.