Veritas' Ejasent Buy Boosts Utility Computing Effort

Veritas plans to acquire Ejasent for $59 million in cash. The deal is expected to close this month.

Ejasent, Mountain View, Calif., brings to Veritas its core software application, UpScale, which allows applications to be moved from server to server without disruption. The software takes a snapshot of the application and its state for transfer in near realtime. Ejasent also brings its MicroMeasure set of tools for tracking applications across servers for use in metering and customer chargebacks.

"Simplifying the management of IT infrastructure that is 'always-on' for end users is a fundamental objective of utility computing," said Mark Bregman, executive vice president of product operations at Veritas. "Ejasent's technology adds another key building block to the Veritas portfolio."

Ejasent is Veritas' third utility computing acquisition in 13 months. The company previously acquired Precise Software, whose i3 technology monitors application performance, and Jareva Technologies, whose OpForce technology automates server deployment.

Troy Toman, senior director of product management at Veritas, said that as his company integrates Ejasent with its i3 and OpForce products, the result will be a total application utility computing offering.

"Let's say you deploy a database on a two-way server and monitor performance with i3," Toman said. "If traffic is high, i3 can notify OpForce, which can then automatically provision a four-way server. Then UpScale can move the application to the new server without disruption."

Dan Carson, vice president of marketing and business development at Open Systems Solutions, a Yardley, Pa.-based Veritas partner, said Veritas' utility computing strategy has good potential if the vendor can tie it to storage management as part of a systemwide management capability.