Morphlabs, Dell DCS Team on SSD-Powered Cloud

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Morphlabs mCloud Data Center Unit packages SSD-powered infrastructure and software to create private clouds for service providers or enterprises (Photo: Morphlabs).

Solid State Drives (SSDs) are moving into the cloud in a bigger way. This week Morphlabs announced that it has teamed with Dell Data Center Solutions (DCS) to deploy a cloud platform powered by SSD from end-to-end.

Morphlabs creates "cloud in a box" private cloud offerings that allow service providers and enterprises to quickly deploy both the hardware and software for their cloud infrastructure.  MorphLabs’ mCloud Data Center Unit (DCU) will be powered by the Dell PowerEdge C portfolio, the hyperscale server line developed by the Dell DCS team.

Improved IOPS Performance

Morphlabs says its offering is the first all-SSD converged infrastructure platform, and will drive higher performance with an increase in input/output operations per second (IOPs) of up to 10 times.

"We’re excited to work with Dell, the leader in hyperscale computing," said Winston Damarillo, CEO, Morphlabs. "At Morphlabs, our goal is to redefine and revolutionize the world of converged private cloud infrastructure and make blazing fast, dedicated private cloud possible for our customers all over the world. With the Dell PowerEdge C Series platform, we have the largest amount of processing power directly attached to storage, allowing us to eliminate traditional SANs."

"Morphlabs has successfully pre-integrated compute, storage and networking into its mCloud solutions,"  said Steve Cumings, executive director of Dell DCS. "We’re thrilled they chose the power of Dell’s PowerEdge C5220 microserver as the basis of their converged platform for running mission-critical applications."

Small Number of Clouds Using SSD

Other providers that have integrated SSD into their offerings include Storm on Demand, CloudSigma and CleverKite, while startup SolidFire is selling SSD-powered storage appliances optimized for cloud providers.

"So, why haven’t cloud enablement providers employed SSDs throughout the cloud before now? Traditionally, SSDs are expensive," writes Yoram Heller,  VP of Corporate Development, on the Morphlabs blog. "But by leveraging Dell’s PowerEdge C-Platform, that combines both IOPS and computing power on the same blade, and innovative open source software elements to manage complex orchestration, Morphlabs has eliminated the need for a traditional Enterprise SAN architecture."

Morphlabs launched in 2007 as Morph Appspace, one of the early solution providers using Amazon Web Services (AWS). In 2010 Appspace was reintroduced as mCloud On-Demand, a free cloud computing service that works with Amazon EC2, and Morphlabs launched the mCloud series of cloud-enabling products targeted at data centers, service providers and the enterprise market in Japan, North America and Asia.

Among the service providers adopting the Dell/Morphlabs SSD cloud are Pratesis and Alchemy Communications.

"By working closely with Morphlabs, Alchemy has a partner that helps us stay current with the most advanced cloud technologies," said Zane Alsabery, CEO, Alchemy Communications, Inc.  "Alchemy is excited about the prospect of being one of the first data center companies to offer our customers an all-SSD cloud offering in conjunction with Morphlabs powered by Dell."