Things happen fast in this industry, if you're not careful, you can easily miss a key happening. This morning BMC has moved to acquire Bladelogic. This was predicted in the DCS VantagePoint document that is currently in our production process (i.e. we finished writing it several weeks ago, but the paper has to go through a copy edit and presentation polishing).
I applaud this move because BladeLogic's automation software will help boost BMC's data center management portfolio. In fact, the Bladelogic acquisition reminds me of the Opsware acquisition by HP, and may be a direct response to HP's move. But Like HP's acquisition of Opsware, BMC has lots of work to do to integrate their current product set with Bladelogic. First, HP had the problem of integrating their Mercury CMDB (from another acquisition) with the Opsware CMDB. Federation is their answer. BMC will have the same issue with Bladelogic's CMDB and BMC's Atrium CMDB. Next is product portfolio overlap and console convergence. If BMC cannot converge and reduce consoles within their portfolio, then they are simply giving customers one more console to the proliferation of consoles they already have in their environment. Finally, BMC has to be careful not to smother Bladelogic. Bladelogic made a name for themselves through workflow automation and infrastructure management. Administrators are tired of managing each device at a low level. Bladelogic helped free administrators from the chains of individual system management. BMC may do well to consider integrating BMC's products into Bladelogic's automation and workflow engine rather than vice-versa.
So, who's next? Well, keep an eye on Opalis. They have a similar functionality set and could be a target for one of the remaining larger players such as CA or IBM Tivoli.
[posted by Drue Reeves]
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