Azure Appliances

At the 2010 Worldwide Partner Conference, Microsoft unveiled the Windows Azure platform appliance. The Azure appliance is a highly integrated bundle of rack-based storage and servers (Microsoft recommends that it contain at least 1,000 servers in its initial iteration) that can be assembled by an OEM. One example, shown at the conference, is about 100 square feet in size, including two server racks with an aisle between them and space for air circulation on the other side of each rack.

Azure appliances are certified by Microsoft, which will place and manage an instance of its Windows Azure platform infrastructure on every appliance, charging customers a subscription fee for that service. Customers will get a discount on Azure services because Microsoft is not paying for the hardware, connectivity, and power that it does for the Azure services it hosts in its own data centers.

Initially, the appliances will likely be hosted by OEMs (Dell, Fujitsu, and HP are among OEMs that will build the appliances) and large hosting services (eBay already uses an Azure appliance to host its iPad auction site), but the appliances are expected to make their way down to smaller hosters and even end customers. HP will likely build Azure appliance capabilities into its HP Performance-Optimized Data Centers, or PODs, which are data centers built into shipping containers for rapid deployment and capacity expansion.