FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

StackIQ Signs Agreement with Hortonworks to Resell Hortonworks Data Platform

Company Will Offer Complete Apache Hadoop Solution for Enterprise Customers.

San Diego, CA – May 15, 2012 – StackIQ, a recognized leader in infrastructure management solutions for Big Data, announced today that it has signed a reseller agreement with Hortonworks a leading commercial vendor promoting the innovation, development and support of Apache Hadoop. The agreement will enable StackIQ to offer new products to accelerate the adoption of Apache Hadoop by enterprise data centers.

Enterprises everywhere are racing to deploy Apache Hadoop to enhance their data management capabilities. StackIQ is developing solutions that will make it easier for enterprise customers to deploy and manage Hadoop by leveraging the leading technologies from both vendors to create the first enterprise Hadoop solution that handles everything from deployment on bare metal all the way to the application.

StackIQ will combine the Hortonworks Data Platform with StackIQ’s Rocks+ Cluster Management technologies to create an integrated solution that addresses the problems enterprise data centers experience when developing Hadoop solutions internally. The Hortonworks Data Platform powered by Apache Hadoop, is a massively scalable, 100 percent open source platform for storing, processing and analyzing large volumes of data. The platform includes the most popular and essential Apache Hadoop projects including HDFS, MapReduce, HCatalog, Pig, Hive, HBase and Zookeeper. These combined solutions will make it easier to bring a Hadoop project from proof-of-concept, to production, to scale-out.

“We are excited to be able to offer the first Hadoop solution for enterprise customers that addresses the often overlooked problem of setting up and managing the underlying cluster for Hadoop,” said Joe Markee CEO of StackIQ. “By partnering with Hortonworks, we are able to leverage their thought leadership, technologies, and support infrastructure for Apache Hadoop.”
The two companies have also entered into a support agreement that will let StackIQ customers take full advantage of Hortonworks’ deep domain expertise in Apache Hadoop.

“Rocks+ represents the most complete provisioning and management platform the Apache Hadoop community has ever seen,” said Ari Zilka, Chief Products Officer at Hortonworks. “We intend to work closely with StackIQ to both leverage lessons learned from their vast management expertise and to tightly integrate Rocks+ with the Apache Ambari project, which is a monitoring, administration and lifecycle management project for Apache Hadoop clusters.”

About StackIQ

StackIQ (formerly “Clustercorp”) is a leading provider of software that automates the deployment and management of Big Infrastructure. Based on open-source Rocks cluster management software, StackIQ’s Rocks+ product simplifies the installation and management of the hardware and software that provides the infrastructure for large scale environments having hundreds or thousands of servers supporting Big Data, Analytics, or High Performance Computing. For more information visit www.StackIQ.com

Rocks+ includes software developed by the Rocks Cluster Group at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the University of California, San Diego and its contributors. Rocks® is a registered trademark of the Regents of the University of California.

Contact:
Lionel Gibbons
StackIQ, Inc.
858-380-2020
Lionel.Gibbons@StackIQ.com

# # #

“When you add up all expenses over a server’s lifetime, labor costs amount to about 70 percent of the total, according to IBM.”

“It’s not uncommon for a company to take weeks or even a month between a server’s arrival and its deployment.”

It’s great to see a veteran of the Enterprise Data Center, acknowledge the massive Total Cost of Ownership impact for commissioning and upgrading systems. They’ve set out to solve this problem by developing a tightly integrated combination of IBM hardware and IBM management software, that is expert at sending and anticipating resource needs to optimize your infrastructure.

“The key feature is something called the Flex Systems Manager, which is IBM-made software that automates a lot of the set-up and maintenance work that traditionally has to be done more or less manually by one or a team of IT managers. ‘The purpose of the code is to do discovery. … Can I locate every piece of hardware in the frame? What are the rules for configuring it? Can I locate all the software I need and what are the rules for configuring that?’, [said IBM’s Steve Mills]”

Flex Systems Manager takes a cue from our cluster manager, Rocks.  More on this in a minute.

“All that data has been gathered into a single screen that makes the relevant information available at a glance. Mills says the system can be up and running within four hours of arriving at a company’s loading dock. That’s a bold claim.”

That’s a bold claim indeed, but one we are quite familiar with, as our customers have been building data centers from bare metal up to the applications layer in about an hour for the last ten-years. This is not, however, where I will explain why & how we already have this right, and IBM has it wrong.  Actually, I think IBM has done a great job here, we are simply focusing on different areas.  IBM has taken the approach of focusing on building on its robust hardware, leveraging the simplicity they get from a known platform, and then generalizing across a broad application set.

StackIQ, having grown out of the open source software community, has always been deeply committed to supporting commodity, heterogeneous hardware platforms. At the software layer, we have nailed down a few mission critical cluster use cases.  In particular, we started with High Performance Computing (HPC). We’re very proud of the fact that our open source software is used more than all other named solutions combined in the HPC space according to a recent Intersect360 study. Today, we are taking what we’ve learned to innovate in the Big Data management space. Our Big Data distribution is the only robust end-to-end Hadoop solution that runs on commodity hardware (bare metal up to the applications layer) — finally making Hadoop clusters consumable to the enterprise.

“In the end, the point is to allow a company’s employees to spend more time working on their key lines of business and less time making the computers run properly, which is at its most basic level the IT shop’s highest mission.”

Well said Arik, and well done IBM.  We agree.

-Tim
@timmcintire
@StackIQ

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Key Hadoop Distributed File System Contributor Dhruba Borthakur joins StackIQ Technical Advisory Board

Software Engineer Instrumental in Scaling Facebook’s Hadoop Environment Brings Extensive Experience to Leading Infrastructure Management Software Company.

San Diego, CA – February 21, 2012 – StackIQ, the Big Infrastructure Company, today announced that Dhruba Borthakur has been appointed to its Technical Advisory Board. Borthakur, a leading contributor to the Apache Hadoop Distributed File System open source project, will serve as advisor to the company’s product & engineering team, guiding the development of Big Data management software.

Mr. Borthakur is a software engineer at Facebook and has been one of the lead contributors for the Hadoop Distributed File System. He has been associated with Hadoop since its inception while working for Yahoo, and is currently instrumental in scaling Facebook’s Hadoop cluster to multiples of petabytes. Dhruba also contributes actively to the Apache HBase project.

“We’re thrilled to have such an experienced Apache Hadoop contributor on board,” Said Mason Katz, Chief Technology Officer, StackIQ. “With Dhruba’s guidance, StackIQ will provide our users with big infrastructure management software that is finely tuned to the way Big Data clusters operate.”

About StackIQ

StackIQ (formerly “Clustercorp”) is a leading provider of software that automates the deployment and management of Big Infrastructure. Based on open-source Rocks cluster management software, StackIQ’s Rocks+ product simplifies the installation and management of the hardware and software that provides the infrastructure for large scale environments having hundreds or thousands of servers supporting Big Data, Analytics, or High Performance Computing.

StackIQ is located in La Jolla, California, adjacent to the University of California, San Diego, where the open-source Rocks Group was founded. To learn more visit http://www.StackIQ.com

Rocks+ includes software developed by the Rocks Cluster Group at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the University of California, San Diego and its contributors. Rocks® is a registered trademark of the Regents of the University of California.

Contact:
Lionel Gibbons
StackIQ, Inc.
858-380-2020
Lionel.Gibbons@StackIQ.com

# # #

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

StackIQ Updates Rocks+ Infrastructure Management Solution for Big Data and High Performance Computing

Company Adds New Hadoop Management Features, and Workload Management Support.

San Diego, CA – February 16, 2012 – StackIQ today announced the immediate availability of Rocks+ 6.0.1, an update to the comprehensive software suite for automating the deployment and management of Big Infrastructure. This release expands on 6.0 adding new Hadoop management features, and new High Performance Computing features.

The updated version of Rocks+ makes managing Big Data clusters easier thanks to all-new Hadoop graphical management features. The release also expands the choice of High Performance Computing workload managers with updated Rolls for CUDA, OFED, Solarflare, Moab, and Univa Grid Engine. And the new “a la carte” packaging of Rolls makes it easier to tailor a Rocks+ solution to meet users requirements.

“Rocks+ 6.0.1 adds the new features our customers have been looking for, and keeps rocks at the forefront of new technologies,” said Tim McIntire, President of StackIQ. “It’s important to us that our customers always have the tools they need to be productive.”

About StackIQ

StackIQ (formerly “Clustercorp”) is a leading provider of software that automates the deployment and management of Big Infrastructure. Based on open-source Rocks cluster management software, StackIQ’s Rocks+ product simplifies the installation and management of the hardware and software that provides the infrastructure for large scale environments having hundreds or thousands of servers supporting Big Data, Analytics, or High Performance Computing.

StackIQ is located in La Jolla, California, adjacent to the University of California, San Diego, where the open-source Rocks Group was founded. To learn more visit http://www.StackIQ.com

Rocks+ includes software developed by the Rocks Cluster Group at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the University of California, San Diego and its contributors. Rocks® is a registered trademark of the Regents of the University of California.

Contact:
Lionel Gibbons
StackIQ, Inc.
858-380-2020
Lionel.Gibbons@StackIQ.com

# # #

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Veteran Executive Mike Murphy Joins StackIQ Board of Directors

Seasoned Executive Brings Extensive Track Record of Business Results to Leading Cluster Management Software Company.

San Diego, CA – February 7, 2012 – StackIQ, the Big Infrastructure Company, today announced that Michael Murphy has been appointed to its Board of Directors. Murphy has three decades of technology management and sales experience. He will help guide StackIQ’s growth with a focus on customer acquisition and sales development.

“The expansion of StackIQ’s Board of Directors ensures the company will take full advantage of the opportunities presented by the rapid expansion of Big Data market,” Said Joe Markee, CEO StackIQ. “Mike stood out as an exceptional candidate to help us through this dynamic period in the company’s expansion, and we’re thrilled to have him on board.”

Murphy served as Chief Executive Office of InQuira, Inc. from 2001 to 2011, when the company was acquired by Oracle. Mike led the company in delivering a comprehensive knowledge management solution that delivered a multi-cannel customer support solution across industries. Customers included such industry leaders as Apple, Intuit, Hartford, eBay, and Bank of America.

Prior to InQuira, Murphy served as a Sr. VP at Cambridge Technology Partners where he ran the Western Region and oversaw its sales, marketing, alliances and partner programs. Prior to his tenure at Cambridge Technology Partners, he spent 13 years with Hewlett Packard.

“StackIQ is quickly reaching a critical stage as enterprises have started embracing Big Data,” said Murphy. “I look forward to helping StackIQ make the most of the opportunities on their doorstep.”

About StackIQ

StackIQ (formerly “Clustercorp”) is a leading provider of software that automates the deployment and management of Big Infrastructure. Based on open-source Rocks cluster management software, StackIQ’s Rocks+ product simplifies the installation and management of the hardware and software that provides the infrastructure for large scale environments having hundreds or thousands of servers supporting Big Data, Analytics, or High Performance Computing.

StackIQ is located in La Jolla, California, adjacent to the University of California, San Diego, where the open-source Rocks Group was founded. To learn more visit http://www.StackIQ.com

Rocks+ includes software developed by the Rocks Cluster Group at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the University of California, San Diego and its contributors. Rocks® is a registered trademark of the Regents of the University of California.

Contact:
Lionel Gibbons
StackIQ, Inc.
858-380-2020
Lionel.Gibbons@StackIQ.com

# # #

We consider the acquisition to be validation of our position that the expertise gained in the cluster space is exactly what’s needed to build modern big data infrastructure. It’s good to see that one of the largest IT infrastructure players understands the value that cluster software brings to the table. Clearly, IBM recognizes that the problems that need solving in the cloud and big data spaces are very similar to those that the HPC community solved long ago.

I expect we’ll continue to see increased demand for cluster solutions — such as Platform/IBM’s workload management software (LSF & Symphony), and StackIQ’s infrastructure management software (Rocks+) — as more companies move their big data plans beyond the proof-of-concept stage into full on deployment.

So kudos to IBM for seeing the future of big data, and to Platform Computing for ensuring their part in it. We look forward to continuing our work with Dell, HP, IBM, and Amazon as a leading independent solution provider for infrastructure management.

-Tim
@timmcintire
@StackIQ

StackIQ is seeking a Linux developer with interest in developing cloud and big data software to help drive the development of a management system for large scale distributed systems (clusters and clouds). Candidate should have interest in either traditional data center management tools (Puppet, Chef, etc), big data (Hadoop, NoSQL, etc), and/or cloud platforms (EC2/S3, CloudStack, Eucalyptus, etc). Ideal candidate would have experience in either big data or cloud environments. Preferred programming experience in Python, SQL, C, and Object-Oriented design. Candidate should have a B.S. in Computer Science (or equivalent), understand group software development and use of version control tools (cvs, git). Position is in San Diego. Please submit resumes to jobs@StackIQ.com.

Software Engineer (User Interface)

StackIQ is seeking a Linux Web Application developer to design and implement a monitoring and control panel for large scale distributed systems (clusters and clouds). Candidate should have interest in building Java/web-based interfaces to documented APIs (Python) and Databases (MySQL). Preferred experience in Java, Python, and Object-Oriented Design, with standard web frameworks (AJAX, GWT, SproutCore). Candidate should have a B.S. in Computer Science (or equivalent), interest in group software development and routine use of version control tools (cvs, git). Preference given to candidates with proven human factor design experience and a portfolio or prior work. Position is in San Diego. Please submit resumes to jobs@StackIQ.com.

We are often asked, as long time purveyors of software to manage clusters at scale, if we can help sort out the Big Data dilemma. So we’ve put together a Big Data Learning Center to help people find the information they need. There are tutorials, white papers, and links to additional learning resources. We plan to maintain this as a living site, adding new content as Big Data technology develops.

Visitors to the Big Data Learning Center can do more than just read about how to deploy Big Data clusters. They can get hands-on with their Big Data projects using complete Big Data software stacks for Hadoop and NoSQL. The software is free for up to 16 nodes, and ready to install on servers for experimentation and proofs of concept. Those interested in trying out Big Data in the cloud instead of physical servers can use free coupons worth $150 in credit on Amazon Web Services EC2 courtesy of StackIQ and Amazon.

Check out the StackIQ YouTube channel, and come back to see what new content we’ve added.