2014 Predictions: Red Hat plumps for OpenStack

Something different in the way of predictions for 2014 from Red Hat. Arguably the biggest of the `big cheeses’ in the world of enterprise-ready distributions of open source software systems it is no surprise that its predictions are in that area. And as one of main distributors of OpenStack, the company has focused its predictive capabilities on that cloud technology.                

It has also taken different approach in pulling together 2014 predictions from different representatives of the company’s overall OpenStack management team. So, in no particular order, here they are: 

From Krishnan Subramaniam, director, OpenShift strategy, Red Hat

OpenStack in 2014: Ready for enterprise adoption.
OpenStack is, in 2013, what Amazon was in 2008/2009 - people are very interested but they are not spending money to use OpenStack in enterprise IT environments yet. 2014 should change that as the solution has matured and people are readier to embrace it. OpenStack is now enterprise-ready with stable, reliable versions, and that, combined with the support available from the OpenStack ecosystem, will lead to further adoption of OpenStack in the enterprise.

From Radhesh Balakrishnan, general manager, Virtualisation and OpenStack, Red Hat

2014: The Year of the OpenStack Ecosystem
2014 will be the year of the enterprise OpenStack ecosystem. Hardware and software providers will have more products in the market backed by certifications for a peace of mind value proposition. Given the focus on `as-a-service’ solutions, there will be a new range of offerings that will be created with OpenStack as a fabric for the datacentre. Finally, I expect that large system integrators will add OpenStack to their service offerings in 2014.

Telco companies, Banks, and Government Agencies will embrace OpenStack.
In the coming year, the public sector and other highly regulated industries, such as financial, will reach the stage of production deployments of enterprise-grade OpenStack. Security will continue to be an aspect that these industries need to address as they move to the cloud. Driven by security, privacy and compliance needs, the public sector and financial industries will turn to OpenStack to keep their most confidential data with them.

2014 will also be the year where telecommunications-specific OpenStack offerings will enter in the marketplace and be adopted.

From Chuck Dubuque, director, Product Marketing, Virtualisation and OpenStack, Red Hat

A select few enterprise OpenStack distributions – and providers – will rise to the top.
In 2013 we saw the proliferation of OpenStack distributions, to the point where it feels very similar to the early days of Linux – everyone seems to have a Linux distribution. In 2014, we're going to see OpenStack distributions collapse. That's because it's not enough to just repackage bits; providers need really broad and deep knowledge of both OpenStack and Linux. Customers will look toward the organisations that have this deep knowledge as they seek credible solutions that combine OpenStack and Linux. The few companies that have the ability to offer tight integration between the two will be the last ones left standing.

Continued reinforcement of PaaS and OpenStack interoperability.
In 2014, interoperability between Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) offerings and OpenStack will continue to be reinforced. Many people believe OpenStack will replace PaaS. In reality, the two are complementary – PaaS generates workloads, while OpenStack offers a place to store them. We're going to continue to work toward tighter integration and better operability between PaaS and OpenStack.

From Bryan Che, general manager, Red Hat CloudForms

Hybrid cloud management – including OpenStack – will be in-demand.
As enterprises move OpenStack deployments out of a testing environment into a real-time, enterprise deployment environment, they need to be able to manage it. This year, Red Hat debuted CloudForms 3.0 with OpenStack management capabilities, and we are looking forward to developing those capabilities further in 2014. Looking at current data and analyst reports, cloud management is cited as the number one problem enterprises face when they are looking to mobilise their cloud computing resources. 2014 will be the year where large-scale cloud deployments are managed with enterprise-class cloud management solutions, such as Red Hat CloudForms.

In 2014, OpenStack will make its way into the infrastructure of many large stakeholders. I’ll be bold and predict that within the next year, we’ll see OpenStack in five out of the top ten banks and eight out of the top ten telcos.