Roundup: Marvell, Minnesota Consolidation

Here’s a roundup of this week’s headlines from the data center and hosting industry:

Marvell unveils ARMADA XP platform. Marvell (MRVL) announced that it will demonstrate their quad-core processing, enterprise-class cloud computing platform, Marvell ARMADA XP (Extreme Performance).  Making use of four Marvell designed ARM compliant 1.6GHz CPU cores and I/O peripherals the new platform delivers unprecedented performance per watt metrics, empowering the enterprise-class cloud computing applications.  Marvell is utilizing the ARM cell phone chip architecture, similar to cases reported from Smooth Stone and Sea Micro. "Marvell's leadership in mobility, consumer, storage, enterprise networking and Wi-Fi products completes the circuit, delivering a powerful end-to-end total solution to anyone connected to the new global mesh, from consumers to small business and the enterprise," said Weili Dai, Co-Founder of Marvell.  The ARM licensing model is quite flexible when compared to Intel and has the potential to change the economics of servers.

Minnesota data center consolidation.  The state of Minnesota announced a data center consolidation project that will take them from 36 to around two or four data centers. This announcement follows another in which  the state signed a deal with Microsoft to move about 35,000 executive branch employees to the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite. “This important business decision for the State,” said State CIO Gopal Khanna, “represents a cost-effective way to lower our risks while minimizing investment and move costs. Doing it together provides economies of scale and efficiencies no agency can realize on its own.” A Minnesota Daily article talks about how the University of Minnesota is looking into augmenting its existing equipment with up to four portable container-based data centers.