Nutanix Aims to Build Third-Party App Ecosystem on HCI Platform

As more organizations make the shift toward hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) platforms, an interesting phenomenon is starting to occur. Many of the functions that were previously deployed as applications on a server are now being recrafted as applications designed to run on a HCI platform that unifies compute and storage.

Nutanix this week announced it is adding inline anti-virus scans to the Nutanix AFS file system in addition to promising to deliver active-active functionality that will make it simpler for geographically dispersed teams to collaborate using the same files, as well as auditing tools in a future release.

Sunil Potti, chief product and development officer for Nutanix, says beyond the new capabilities being added by Nutanix, the significance of these tools is that they signal the emergence of Nutanix Enterprise Cloud OS as a platform for building and deploying applications. Nutanix partners already moving down this path include Comtrade, Rubrik, Varonis and STEALTHbits, notes Potti.

This approach, says Potti, will ultimately have a significant effect on both operational IT costs and capital IT costs. HCI platforms lower the total cost of acquiring compute and storage, while also making IT infrastructure simpler to manage. The Nutanix Enterprise Cloud OS then makes it simpler to deploy complementary applications across a scale-out IT environment, says Potti.

“More partners will have applications on our OS,” says Potti.

The degree to which Nutanix can shift the focal point for third-party application providers away from traditional operating systems remains to be seen. But the one thing that is clear is that as HCI software gets more widely employed, both on-premises and in the cloud, a new unified server and storage vector for building and deploying application software is starting to emerge.