Data Virtualization: Many Benefits, but not without Challenges

Virtualization is a simulation of the real version of something.  The term can be applied to hardware, software and applications, but typically virtualization refers to software that abstracts the hardware of a physical computer.  Virtual machine software can trick an operating system designed to run on a single physical machine to be able to run within a virtualized environment.  This makes it possible to run multiple virtual machine environments side-by-side on a single physical machine.

A main benefit of virtualization is server consolidation.  In the past software applications would often required to be run on dedicated server hardware, but despite that requirement, very often the application would not fully utilize the resources of the server machine.   Server consolidation using virtualization saves money because it means that less power is required because there are fewer physical machines drawing power and fewer machines require less cooling.  Server consolidation also means that the size of data centers can shrink, making them easier to manage and maintain while saving money since less real estate is required.

Virtualization technology has proven to be very popular.  A survey by Veeam software found that as many as 92 percent of all organizations are using virtual machine technology and that, on average, 40 percent of servers running in organizations today are virtual ones.  The most popular vendors of virtual machine technology are VMware, Microsoft Hyper-V and Citrix Xen.

Ratmir Timashev, President and CEO of Veeam, said “As the significant cost, power and efficiency benefits of virtualization accelerate its position within the enterprise, so the potential of all IT infrastructures to be based on virtual estates increases.”

But the Veeam report found that along with the benefits of virtual machines there are also challenges which include:

• Reliability  (38.8 percent)
• Application performance (32.4 percent)
• More complex backup and restoration processes (32.4 percent)
• Operationally more complex (30.8 percent)

A report by CA technologies found that 60 percent of IT organizations have been disappointed with the cost savings of virtualized environments.  The report found that the main reasons why  organizations are moving to virtualization is becuase they want to reduce costs (85 percent) and to increase server utilization (84 percent).  But the extra effort that IT departments have needed to invest in overcoming these challenges have reduced expected cost savings.

Ian Watts, senior technical manager of BT Americas, said that “Virtualization is a bean counter’s dream, but it can be an operational nightmare.  Change management is a huge overhead, as any changes need to be accepted by all applications and users sharing the same virtualization kit. While many organizations are seeing benefits from virtualization, such as reduced hardware spending and improved server utilization, these benefits often get overshadowed by the lack of productivity improvements in data center staffing and operations.”