Purchase of Nauticus Networks continues Sun's quest to automate data centers

In announcing plans to acquire Nauticus Networks, a privately held manufacturer of multifunction switching products, Sun Microsystems took another step toward fulfilling its vision of creating completely automated data centers.

Sun launched this quest more than two years ago when it unveiled plans for creating a new data center architecture called N1. This architecture, which Sun officials say is roughly half complete, is supposed to let companies deploy and manage all applications and resources on their corporate networks from a single location. Much of the work typically handled by data center employees, such as updating applications and fixing problems with malfunctioning applications, would be done without human intervention.

The purchase of Nauticus is just the latest in a series of acquisitions Sun has made to assemble the technical components necessary to build the N1 architecture. Previous acquisitions include a company called CenterRun Software, which netted Sun a program that can automatically shift computing workloads.

Some of Sun's acquisitions in relation to N1, such as its purchase of Terraspring in 2002, gave Sun the technology to manage applications and resources than run on platforms other than Sun's own Solaris operating system. Industry analysts have said that offering multiplatform support is critical to Sun's chances of turning N1 into a profitable venture because both IBM and Hewlett-Packard (HP) have similar programs in place.

The Nauticus acquisition also could help Sun gain ground in the highly competitive arena for lower-priced servers that run on Intel and AMD chips. Sun is playing catch-up in that space because until recently it sold only servers powered by its own SPARC chips. But the Nauticus switching technology is specifically for managing functions such as caching, load balancing, and security for Web servers, which typically are handled by the lower-priced Intel or AMD boxes.