Enterprise computing systems vendor Unisys Corp co-ordinated an alliance of five leading companies to launch a European ASP enablement program today, and announced plans to open a European Centre of Excellence in Paris.
Microsoft, Unisys, Cisco, EMC and StorageTek today announced ASP 2000, a European initiative that brings together the five partners’ technologies to meet the end-to-end infrastructure needs of application service providers. The aim is to help ASPs draw on the group’s expertise, services and R&D investment to develop new solutions more quickly, and to provide more reliable and comprehensive service to their customers.
Located at the Unisys Technology Centre in Paris, France, the group’s proposed European Centre of Excellence is scheduled to open in September. It will provide a facility where ASPs can fine-tune their infrastructure and solutions and obtain Applications Performance Certification.
“ASP 2000 combines proven, best-of-breed technology to give ASPs a fast route to scalability, reliability and performance, so they can deliver their service commitments without fail and still grow their businesses,” said Robert Tillotson, VP marketing for Unisys systems and technology in EMEA.
Unisys will integrate a complete ASP 2000 data centre architecture, based on its ES7000 server and Microsoft Windows 2000 Datacenter Server. The Microsoft Corp platform, which is due to ship later this year, is expected to appeal to ASPs because it provides the highest levels of scalability and performance yet seen under the Windows architecture – see related ASPnews.com feature, For Microsoft, ASPs are Prime Datacenter Prospects, Jun 21st, 2000.
Cisco network equipment, EMC storage and StorageTek tape libraries will complete the infrastructure, all located on a single SAN (Storage Area Network). The group plans to open up the Centre of Excellence to other vendors to extend the scope of the solution it can offer to ASPs.
The centre will offer various services to optimise ASP end-to-end solutions, including network and data management design, proof of concept, thin client application validation, Web enablement of applications, software architecture audit, redesign and migration. Microsoft and Unisys consultants will be based permanently at the Centre to provide application performance certification.
ASPs will be able to access the Paris facilities via Internet connections from any of five other Unisys Technology Centres in Milan, London, Frankfurt, Zurich and Amsterdam.
Unisys to Open ASP Centre in Paris
