NETWORK WORLD NEWSLETTER: MIKE KARP ON STORAGE IN THE ENTERPRISE
06/07/05
Today's focus: Sun's StorageTek buy makes Sun a significant
player in storage
Dear networking.world@gmail.com,
In this issue:
* Sun buys StorageTek
* Links related to Storage in the Enterprise
* Featured reader resource
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Today's focus: Sun's StorageTek buy makes Sun a significant
player in storage
By Mike Karp
On June 2, Sun announced its intent to acquire Louisville,
Colo.-based StorageTek in a cash purchase. At $4.1 billion, this
is one of the largest high-tech acquisitions in recent history,
bigger than EMC's $1.7 billion purchase of Documentum, although
far smaller than HP's $25 billion purchase of Compaq.
Historically, Sun has been a systems builder that also did
storage, while SorageTek has always been a pure storage and
storage services play. By any standard, Sun's acquisition of a
company that brings in $2.2 billion in storage revenue instantly
makes Sun a much more significant player in storage.
Granted Sun now immediately gets a larger footprint in storage,
but a deal like this is rarely just about buying market share.
In this case, it is also about synergies.
At their announcement of the acquisition, the two companies
identified the following as their "five points of alignment":
software/management products, hardware products, management
talent, global selling and service teams, development and
operations teams.
Take the first two points as given: it is easy to understand the
two companies' storage product sets as being complementary - Sun
has focused on spinning disk in distributed environments, while
a large piece of StorageTek's business is tape for the
mainframe. As for the third point, it probably means more than
that the two groups of execs enjoy drinking coffee together, but
we'll have to wait at least two quarters to see if this is more
than just an obligatory platitude.
Whatever. It is the last two points that are the really
important ones.
For quite some time Sun has said it wants to invest more heavily
in support personnel for storage. When Sun execs sign off on the
acquisition they bring on board all of StorageTek's field
expertise in storage, including sales, support and professional
services. This is a pool of expertise - real, not virtual - of
perhaps 2,000 people. That is a lot of storage experience, and
Sun will want to make use of all of it. Also, these folks can
help get Sun products a hearing in the mainframe environments
they are already servicing.
The development teams will be able to work independently for a
short while, but we should all expect Sun to fast-track
connectivity between the various groups.
In terms of storage resource management, both sides of the deal
are well committed to the SMI-S management standard, so they go
into the new relationship with a common understanding of the
need for using standards where appropriate.
Are the synergies really there? It certainly may be the case,
but the success of groups that need to work together
synergistically depends as much on the "soft issues" -
personalities of the managers, corporate cultures, and so forth
- as they do on the more tangible things. Insensitivity to such
issues can lay waste to even the best laid out strategies. We
will all follow this with interest.
In the mean time, at least two things are certain: first, this
is a watershed event for Sun, as it provides the company with a
proven access route to help penetrate mainframe environments;
and second, once again Sun has made things interesting for the
rest of the industry.
RELATED EDITORIAL LINKS
Sun acquires StorageTek
Network World, 06/02/05
http://www.networkworld.com/nlstorage2407
Study: Networks to get their fill of iSCSI
Network World, 06/06/05
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2005/060605-iscsi.html?rl
Network Life's Storage Strategy Guide
Network World, 06/06/05
http://www.networklifemag.com/news/2005/060605ednote.html?rl
Sun nabs StorageTek in blockbuster
Network World, 06/06/05
http://www.networkworld.com/nlstorage2408
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To contact: Mike Karp
Mike Karp is senior analyst with Enterprise Management
Associates, focusing on storage, storage management and the
methodology that brings these issues into the marketplace. He
has spent more than 20 years in storage, systems management and
telecommunications. Mike can be reached via e-mail
<mailto:mkarp@enterprisemanagement.com>.
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This newsletter is sponsored by Hewlett Packard
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ARCHIVE LINKS
Archive of the Storage newsletter:
http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/stor/index.html
Breaking storage news and analysis:
http://www.networkworld.com/topics/storage.html
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