Microsoft Wants Your Cloud To Be a Hybrid

Do you consider Microsoft to be a cloud thought leader? If so, you may want to hear what it has to say about where its cloud technologies are going.

The Microsoft cloud portfolio is designed to support hybrid clouds, which combine private and public clouds into one working unified system. The relatively new head of the Microsoft Server and Tools division, Satya Nadella, laid out the strategy in a recent investor speech. As when Microsoft went "all in" with the Internet well over a decade ago, it is now "all in" with the cloud.

The cloud is a work in progress for Microsoft, but the long-run plan is a complete portfolio that lets you build any kind of cloud. But the notion of easily building a mixed private and public cloud is, at least for now, the Holy Grail of cloud computing. "Our job number one from a Server and Tools Business is to make sure that we have the core operating system and data tiers available across public and private cloud," Nadella said.

At its simplest level, Microsoft Azure underpins the public cloud, while Windows System Center and Windows Server drive the private side. Nadella thinks Microsoft has a huge advantage since a lot this software is already in nearly every shop. Does Microsoft's installed base give it a leg up in the cloud space? You tell me at [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on 09/13/2011 at 12:47 PM