Sun’s N1 Push Leads to Terraspring

Looking to ease data center management capabilities within its N1 computing
strategy, Sun Microsystems on Friday closed a deal to
acquire start-up Terraspring. Details of the cash-for-stock transaction were
not released.

Sun plans to use logical server farm software from Fremont, Calif.-based
Terraspring to ramp up the virtualization capabilities of its own server and
storage products.

Founded by former Sun employees with $54 million in start-up funding from
Davidow Ventures and Accel Partners, Terraspring specializes in data center
management software. The company’s enterprise clients use the software to
manage servers, storage and firewalls.

The Terraspring software works with multiple operating systems, including
Windows/NT, Linux and Solaris.

Sun said the addition of Terraspring’s software is a significant step in the
execution of N1, the company’s data center optimization strategy. “In this
first phase of N1, separate network, compute and storage elements are
transformed into a single supply of resources,” the Santa Clara,
Calif.-based firm said.

The company sees the integration of Terraspring’s software as a way to lure
customers into implementing the N1 architecture, which promises to simplify
the complexity of managing data centers and lower operating costs.