Next-Generation Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure: Cloud-Managed and Highly Flexible

Next-Generation Management Tools Are Essential for Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure
Organizations are making fundamental changes to their infrastructure to make it effective for the digital age. But if that new hardware is going to meet the demands IT will place on it, the management tools will have to be up to the job. Optimal management tools simplify daily operations and automate as many tasks as possible. That’s because IT Ops teams cannot keep up by manually adjusting infrastructure, the complexity and dynamism of which create a greater number of management actions that must occur in near real time.

Cisco Intersight and UCS X-Series Combine the Necessary New Hardware and Management Functionality IT Needs
Cisco Intersight is a cloud operations platform that includes visualization, optimization and orchestration for applications and infrastructure. It is a complete set of services, enabling IT to better respond to the digital needs of the organization. And these services are delivered via a SaaS model, making it easier to consume these advanced offerings. The core components of Intersight include:

• Intersight Workload Optimizer: Provides detailed visibility of application and infrastructure interdependencies that impact performance; simplifies operational tasks focused on ensuring that application performance is at required levels; automates workload mobility, utilizing all hybrid cloud resources and ensuring performance without constant IT operations intervention.
• Intersight Kubernetes Service (IKS): Fully curated, lightweight container management platform; delivers a production-ready platform for Kubernetes; includes tools for managing, scaling, provisioning and securing virtual or bare-metal containers and automation that supports the entire lifecycle of the container; works with all the most commonly used public cloud-managed K8s products.
• Intersight Virtualization Service: Simplifies the cloud experience by providing visibility of virtualization infrastructure and normalizing operations across multiple private and public clouds. The Intersight Virtualization Service dashboard shows all virtual machine inventory and supporting virtualization infrastructure across these clouds. For enterprises, this means faster, more efficient provisioning and simplified management of daily operations.
• Intersight Cloud Orchestrator: Provides an automation tool that empowers IT teams to support fast workload mobility, matching the speed of the business and the apps that support it, so that IT can implement more standardized operational practices and reduce risks; improves the user experience by always providing a cloud-like environment; works across both cloud and on-premises resources; includes a designer for easily creating complex workflows, so that IT can standardize deployment to improve security, reduce risk and support self-service.
• Intersight Service for HashiCorp Terraform: A joint solution from Cisco and HashiCorp; simplifies infrastructure-as-code strategy for hybrid cloud; supports integration of on-premises resources with Terraform Cloud Business; supports numerous features such as single sign-on (SSO) and audit logging; allows DevOps to consume on-premises resources as needed; lets IT Ops orchestrate apps and workloads across any aspect of the hybrid cloud.

The focus on automation and agility enables IT teams to better meet the demands of the business and enhance efficiency across operations. These services also enhance resiliency. With all the configuration information in the cloud, it is now easy to move workloads from any server that is problematic to a new one that has sufficient resources for that workload. In addition, IT can leverage Cisco X-Series managed service providers (MSPs) to provide location independence in the event of a natural disaster.

Intersight also provides analytics and connected support capabilities that give IT teams instant feedback. With this information, issue resolution can be done quickly and securely. This information can also form the foundation for creating automated scripts that can be deployed for common or recurring problems.

Combining Next-Generation Hardware and Manage Platforms Delivers What Modern IT Needs
The reality for IT is that infrastructure is changing dramatically and fundamentally. A management platform integrated with the hardware is required. The synchronization of the management platform and hardware ensures that all the advanced features are readily accessible. However, it is also necessary to provide support legacy infrastructure, an important capability that Intersight provides. This comprehensive and consistent environment, coupled with higher levels of automation, greatly simplifies IT operations processes and provides future-ready infrastructure. This integrated approach makes it possible to deliver the performance necessary to support the changing compute landscape. The combination of UCS X-Series and Intersight allows IT to incorporate new technologies that deliver greater performance. For example, utilizing the latest Intel Xeon processors as soon as they are available gives IT the performance headroom necessary for demanding workloads.

Cisco Intersight and UCS X-Series deliver the infrastructure solution that meets current and future organizational demands on IT. Get more details on the Cisco UCS X-Series Modular System.