A new original equipment manufacturers (OEM) and support agreement between Sun and HP will make Sun a strategic HP ProLiant OS distribution partner and Solaris will be part of the lineup of key operating environments for the HP ProLiant platform. Announced February 25, the expanded multi-year partnership agreement will allow HP to distribute and provide software technical support for Solaris 10 OS on the HP ProLiant server and blade system platforms.

The agreement gives HP, which is a big player in the server market, another operating system to offer its customers, while giving Sun a wider distribution network for its software.

"We're responding to our customers who have asked for expanded HP ProLiant operating environment support to address their diverse application requirements," said Mark Potter, senior vice president and general manager, BladeSystem and Insight Software, HP. "...the agreement gives our joint customers complete confidence to grow their businesses while also controlling costs."

HP ProLiant customers who prefer Solaris on x86 now have access to a complete infrastructure solution for the data center from a single source, making the purchase process easier and more cost-effective, Sun reports. Previously, customers could run Solaris on HP servers, but had to get the operating system from one company and the computer from the other.

Additionally, HP will be driving issue resolution for the joint solution through HP Technology Services and Sun is providing software updates through its automated Connected Services offerings.

"The endorsement of Solaris on HP ProLiant dramatically expands the available market for Solaris on x86 servers, building on the largest installed-base of any commercial UNIX and Linux distribution," said John Fowler, executive vice president, Systems, Sun.

In his blog, Sun President and CEO Jonathan Schwartz commented, "This relationship brings every major server vendor to the Solaris OEM marketplace, with HP capping a great list of Solaris endorsers that includes Intel, AMD, IBM, Dell and many others. At this stage, we count more than a 1,000 x86 systems supported by Solaris and OpenSolaris, and nearly 8,000 ISV applications. With Intel's Nehalem systems just around the corner, this ensures customers and ISV's looking for a robust, scalable open source cloud operating system, one that leverage every ounce of x86 performance, will see Solaris - alongside ZFS, DTrace, MySQL, Java and a whole array of embedded XVM virtualization support - from every x86 OEM on earth. Congratulations, HP, it's great to have you on the team!"

HP also plans on increasing its participation in the OpenSolaris community, collaborating with other users on feature development and interoperability.

The new deal sets a course for the companies to work together to expand demand for both Solaris and OpenSolaris on both HP ProLiant servers and server blades into new markets.

More Information

Replay of the Audiocast Announcement - registration required

Schwartz and Fowler Discuss HP and Solaris 5:35

Schwartz\'s blog: HP Joins Solaris Community (Live Free or Die)

Solaris on HP ProLiant

Solaris

OpenSolaris [...read more...]

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