HP’s Adds Autonomy And Vertica To Its Information Optimization Strategy

HP Information Optimization Highlights

• Vertica adds real-time parallel processing of structured data
• Autonomy adds an analytics platform for all data (including unstructured sources from monitoring and social feeds)
• Quotes scary market numbers for data growth, but claims it can help manage all enterprise data
• Proposes an Information Optimization architecture, encompassing information use cases, sources management and optimisation layers
• A valid start, but over-productises a services business

HP recently outlined its Information Optimisation strategy – the first chance we’ve had to hear about how it’s using the newly acquired Autonomy and Vertica to beef up its approach to Big Data and the Cloud. We know you’ll be interested to hear how they are approaching these subjects.
Autonomy was acquired for $10.3 billion, while Vertica was acquired at the beginning of 2011 for an undisclosed fee, although it must have been far less given HP’s total acquisition charges of $182 million for the year. Both have maintained their own branded web sites, with the former principally positioned as a real-time parallel processing company for structured data and the latter as analytics platform for unstructured data.

HP’s Scary Information Numbers

Presenter June Manley started with some scary big numbers, quoting IDC’s claim that the Digital Universe stood at 1.8Zbytes in 2010 and was due to grow to 35Zbytes by 2020, that 75% of data is created by individuals, that unstructured data accounts for 85% of the total and quoting the massive number of tweets, text messages and emails. We don’t think it’s a good idea to take this approach when few audiences can get a handle on the numbers. However we agree with the observation that the volumes of data are increasing, while most organisations are struggling to keep up – especially as smart phones and tablets along with social media are merging with traditional ways of creating data.
According to HP, customers need to think big, addressing a number of challenges. In particular (to quote from its presentation) to:

• Power it – Infrastructure to drive it
• Protect it – Security to keep it safe
• Know it – Be able to analyse it and drive insight into foresight in data bases and beyond
• Integrate it – Make it relevant to their organization
• Share it – In all its forms – digitally and physically
• Create it – They have to take the bright minds of humans to dream up big ideas that make tomorrow a better place’

These 6 aims are built into HP’s Information Analytics architecture, as you can see in Figure 1.
We’re sure few of the CIOs who are struggling to keep up with the data explosion have ever thought that the world will end up a better place by their efforts.
HP’s intention is to help its customers ‘Leverage and use 100% of all enterprise relevant information’. Again it’s an unusually bullish ambition. June gave some examples of HP customers using new information in their process. In particular:

• Tesco, which compares sensor data with pictures of store shelves to monitor in real time the products which are selling fastest
• The New York Times, which monitors the readership of each article in real time to add new content at appropriate times

While these are good examples of companies using new data in interesting ways, they do not demonstrate that either is analysing all of the data coming into their organisations. We’re sure that Tesco, for instance, has a lot of under-utilised RFID information.

HP Information Optimisation Offerings

It’s very much early days for HP’s new analytics business. On the call it split them into 4 of the 6 categories shown in its architecture, as well as into new and old offerings. These include:

• E5000 Messaging Systems Appliance, which is based on Microsoft Exchange
• B6200 Storeonce Backup System
• X5000 Storage System
• Data Protector V6.2 Software
• Autonomy IDOL 10 ‘Next Gen Information Platform’
• Business Service Manager 9.1, which monitors Cloud, mobile, virtualisation and physical business service performance ‘proactively’
• Application Lifecycle Maintenance with Application Lifecycle Intelligence 2.0
• IT Performance Suite VP Apps Edition, tuned management software for ‘applications executives’ and VP Ops Edition, which is integrated with HP IT Executive Scorecard
• Social Intelligence Services, which include Strategy Alignment Workshop, Master Plan, Competency Center, Proof of Concept and Solution Implementation elements
• Storage Consulting and Vertica-specific services

We’ve captured its highlighted offerings in Figure 2. While it’s useful to think about the software and hardware products tied into its new strategy, this is a services business and it will be interesting to see how more developments in this area.

Some Conclusions – Over-Ambitious, Over-Productised?

We’re not religious, but keep thinking about the parable in the Bible (Luke 8 4-21), where some seed

• ‘fell beside the road; and it was trampled under foot, and the birds of the air ate it up. And other seed fell on rocky soil, and as soon as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture. And other seed fell among the thorns; and the thorns grew up with it, and choked it out. And other seed fell into the good soil, and grew up, and produced a crop a hundred times as great.’

When it comes to data, the challenge isn’t to try to capture and manage all of it, rather to identify valuable new sets to research and act over and real-time techniques are undoubtedly needed for the mass of unstructured data coming in from monitoring and metering and social feeds.
HP’s acquired resources increase its capabilities significantly, although we believe it lags significantly behind IBM in business analytics. It will be a major challenge for the company to integrate Autonomy without a significant clash of cultures. In this presentation it over-emphasised the scary numbers, its ambitions and over-powered us with product descriptions; but we’ll put that down to a lack of time, rather than strategy. We’ll watch its progress closely.