Virtualization

In today's enterprise-level data centers, virtualization is the term that describes the abstraction of tangible computer resources. It is essentially the separation of physical computing equipment (processors and hard-drives) from the applications that rely on them. A "virtual" application allows a piece of software compiled for a specific computer to run unmodified on different computers and operating systems. Even multiple operating systems can safely coexist on one physical machine. In an economic contraction such as the one we're currently experiencing in the U.S., the virtualization of computing resources is becoming increasingly important to organizations. Because of virtualization technology's ability to reduce costs and decrease reliance on physical hardware, a company's IT infrastructure doesn't rely as much on new servers and storage devices. Instead, it uses existing hardware to increase productivity. While such productivity gains are an obvious and near-term advantage in virtualization, the technology has considerable implications if we consider how the computing landscape will fundamentally change with the separation of physical resources from applications.

Consider first, that business innovation has accelerated in recent years with the emergence of faster technology deployment, more integration between disparate systems, and the rapid surge of world-class human talent into the high-tech industry. Because virtualization reduces the need for organizations to ramp-up expensive physical resources in order to deploy new technology, the adoption and use of new applications is much faster. As these new applications are integrated into a company's business processes, business capabilities are enhanced and overall efficiency increases. With the resulting improvements in productivity and collaboration, the business case for virtualization extends beyond cost savings and into organizational effectiveness.

Second, the architecture of an organization becomes more flexible as a result of virtualized applications. Businesses which experience "spikes" in IT requirements (ticketing agencies during big concerts, toy stores at Christmas, health-care data centers during flu season, weather centers during hurricanes, etc.) no longer need to design their IT architecture around their maximum computing requirements. With more reliance on virtualization, IT infrastructure can be made more resilient and handle demand spikes. Businesses can continue to operate without worry of exhausting their IT resources due to limitations in physical infrastructure.

Third, and most fundamentally, consider that the core of a business process no longer relies on a machine, but rather a piece of intellectual capital. What does this do to the business world in which we operate? Would the increased "liquidity" of intellectual resources in this cloud of processing power and data storage be bound by the same rules of supply and demand as all other economically driven processes? While it may sound rather far-fetched, I would like to propose that if a company's intellectual capital IS its product, and that intellectual capital is no longer bound by resource constraints in the physical realm, the traditional axiom of supply and demand is no longer applicable. If companies were able to break free from this fundamental productivity contraint simply by shifting their products to those of a more intangible nature, the business landscape would be changed forever.

Business productivity that relies on physical materials tends to be linear in relation to infrastructural investments. The increased data liquidity that virtualization enables changes the way that data centers and consequently businesses, architect themselves for the future. In addition to aforementioned gains in productivity and technology deployment, the fluid and highly cooperative nature of virtualized environments will inevitably lead to symbiotic relationships between different business applications...an evolution of sorts. It is interesting to note that we have already observed such transformations in biological systems...but that's another blog post.