Brocade made a splash in software-defined networking by acquiring network virtualization startup Vyatta in an all-cash transaction. Vyatta has built its own open-source operating system that runs on standard x86 hardware as well as most virtualization and cloud platforms and delivers enterprise-level routing, security and infrastructure features.

"We are now bolstering these 'build and partner' efforts with this strategic acquisition with the goal of being the innovation and thought leader in the software networking category," Mike Klayko, Brocade's outgoing CEO, said in a statement.

Indian IT services giant Rolta is acquiring AT Solutions Group, LLC, the parent company of AdvizeX Technologies, in a $32 million deal that stands to reshape the competitive landscape in the data center. The deal is aimed at taking advantage of fast emerging technologies such as big data, business intelligence and software-defined networking.

"We are going to be the first company to put a major effort behind combining a leading system integrator and VAR to attack this software-defined data center opportunity," AdvizeX President Fred Traversi told CRN this week. "I told our AdvizeX employees that our customers and OEM partners are going to require a redefinition of the IT channel as it stands today."

Rackspace saw revenue jump 27 percent and profit 36 percent in a fiscal third quarter that did nothing to dispel the notion of its fast becoming a top player in the cloud computing market.

"We're excited to report that the rollout of our new Open Cloud platform, built on OpenStack, is finally complete," Lanham Napier, CEO of Rackspace, said in a statement. "With the new products now in production, Rackspace offers a better, faster and more valuable cloud experience, built on an open platform that gives our customers true choice and control without the fear of being locked in to one vendor's technology."

IBM is going after the entry-level SMB storage market with its new Storwize V3700 storage array, which includes the same code stack as its higher-end Storwize V7000. IBM is also including its SAN Volume Controller (SVC) storage virtualization technology, which enables replication, thin provisioning and other features.

About 80 percent of IBM's midrange storage revenue comes from indirect sales channels, and that will likely be the case with the Storwize 3700, according to Lief Morin, president of Key Information Systems, a Woodland Hills, Calif.-based solution provider and IBM partner.

Amazon is adding a new local caching feature for primary storage that might be upsetting to vendors that already tie local storage to the Amazon Web Services cloud. The new gateway-cached volumes feature stores frequently accessed primary data locally with the bulk stored on the cloud for low-cost and scalability.