Think virtualization isn’t for you? Think again!

In recent years, virtualization has moved past its buzzword phase. Businesses are not only just talking about the potential impact of the trend, but are experiencing tangible benefits from it as well. As more organizations implement virtualization strategies, one question comes up time and time again for those that have not yet adopted it: Just what are you waiting for?

The American Daily Herald noted that the concept of virtualization has been around since the mid ’90s, but some groups are still unsure about the practicality of the technology. Let’s examine virtualization, including how businesses are actually putting these systems to use and how they benefit from them.

How are businesses using virtualization?
There are a number of ways today’s enterprises are harnessing the power of virtualization, including:

• Server consolidation: Since virtualization was first introduced, server consolidation has been its main use case. With a virtualization strategy in place, companies can utilize the available resources on their hardware more efficiently, enabling them to reduce the number of machines needed to support their infrastructure. This means less maintenance and more time for the IT team to focus on other mission-critical projects.
• Automation: As the world becomes more advanced and technologically-centered, automation and orchestration are seen on a more common basis. Virtualization allows companies to take control of their automated processes by allowing them to monitor all ongoing IT activities and processes from a single platform.
• Enabling growth: TechTarget contributor Brian Kirsch noted that even small businesses have taken advantage of virtualization, despite only having a handful of servers supporting their infrastructure.”The advantage of virtualization is that it allows the SMB to have additional resources on standby, allowing it to assign those resources as needed,” Kirsch wrote. “This flexibility allows for growth without a large budget.”

But the potential uses for virtualization don’t end with servers. VMware noted that other systems can benefit from a virtual strategy, including applications, storage systems and the overall network.

Virtualization allows organizations to use their available resources more efficiently.

Reaping the benefits of virtualization
Now that we’ve examined how virtualization is used in today’s enterprise sector, the question becomes, “How are these organizations benefiting from this approach?” Businesses have seen a number of advantages with virtualization, including:

• Sustainability: In the current environment, there’s a much larger focus on green practices, and virtualization can go a long way in this regard. Think of it this way: Less servers translates to reduced power and cooling needs, and can also lead to savings in operational costs. A win-win for the company and the environment.
• Boosted uptime: Every network administrator fears the phrase “The network is down.” With virtualization, this sentence can be uttered much less frequently. InfoWorld contributor David Marshall noted that virtual environments include several innovative features that simply aren’t accessible on physical servers. These capabilities can not only help with uptime, but can be a boon for business continuity as well.”[Virtual server] usually offer capabilities such as live migration, storage migration, fault tolerance, high availability and distributed resource scheduling,” Marshall wrote. “These technologies keep virtual machines chugging along or give them the ability to quickly recover from unplanned outages.”

These are just a few benefits to be had with virtualization. To find out more about how virtualization can be advantageous for your company, contact iT1 Source today.