Veritas bulks up its utility computing lineup

Veritas Software plans to expand its utility computing portfolio with the acquisition of software maker Ejasent for $59 million.

Veritas' purchase of Ejasent, which was founded in 1999, comes after the acquisition last year of two other utility computing-related companies--Jareva and Precise Software. Veritas expects the Ejasent transaction to be completed by the end of January.

Veritas executives said that the Ejasent deal, announced Wednesday, is another building block in its utility computing plan. In June, the company began its utility computing push in an effort to get beyond its storage roots and position itself in the emerging market.

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The idea of utility computing is that corporations will be able to purchase computing services, such as processing power, storage and software applications, on a per-usage basis, much as home owners and businesses buy energy.

Veritas and other large hardware companies are investing in technologies that automate tasks for running corporate data centers, such as configuring and provisioning servers and storage devices, with an aim to let corporate customers make better use of their hardware, react quickly to changes in computing demand and lower the cost of administration.

 A $59 million purchase adds to Veritas' product line

Ejasent's main software line, called UpScale, is designed to move a software application from one server to another automatically. This "application virtualization" capability could be used to shift an application to more servers in order to meet a spike in processing need, such as quarterly financial reporting.

The other tool Veritas gains in the Ejasent transaction is called MicroMeasure, a system that lets companies measure usage of computing resources for billing purposes.

Veritas intends to offer UpScale and MicroMeasure releases in the second quarter of this year. A Linux version of UpScale is set for release in early 2005 to complement the current Solaris version.

The software maker's tactic of snapping up smaller niche providers of data center management mirrors that of other utility computing companies.

Sun Microsystems enhanced its N1 product line through a series of purchases last year, including acquisitions of Pirus Networks, CenterRun and TerraSpring. IBM purchased Think Dynamics in May.