HP Tightens Up ProCurve Story

As Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) moves into the post-Fiorina era, the company this week provided an insight into what its future network strategy will look like (see HP ProCurve Expands Security).

Set against the backdrop of Fiorinas departure there has been plenty of speculation that parts of the HP empire could be spun off, namely its PC business. However, the company scotched these rumors by merging its PC operation with its printing business (see HP Plots New Course).

HP is taking a decidedly different approach with its ProCurve switching product family, for whatever reason. At grass-roots level, the firm is taking a leaf from its archrival Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO) by consolidating security features around its flagship switch product. Two years ago HP unveiled its 700 Series of 2U secure access appliances designed to sit in front of a switch and control user authentication and security policies.

However, HP told NDCF that the 700’s core technology has now been “squished down” into a blade that fits onto the firm’s 5300xl switch. Cisco recently undertook a similar move by developing a specialized security blade for its Catalyst 6500 family of switches (see Cisco Sets Out Security Strategy).

One of the major challenges for data center managers is dealing with a multitude of security appliances, so both firms are looking to exploit a "less is more" strategy. “The hope is that we can get that [technology] into as many products that need it on the intelligent edge of the network,” says Amol Mitra, HP’s worldwide ProCurve product marketing manager.HP is clearly pinning its colors to the edge, with the 5300 switch being used to entice users to the company’s Adaptive Edge strategy. Essentially, this means that devices on the network edge handle the likes of authentication, routing, and traffic management, as opposed to products at the network core.

But the challenge that HP faces is one of awareness: Cisco is synonymous with networking technologies, whereas HP is better known for its PCs, printers, and servers. However, the Palo Alto-based firm is attempting to combat this by drawing technology from other parts of its business.

A good example of this is the “Virus Throttling” software that was first deployed on the company’s ProLiant range of servers. A version of this has now been rolled out onto the 5300 switch to analyze traffic coming through the device’s ports. This searches for unusual network behavior in an attempt to tackle unforeseen Internet attacks (see Is Zero Day a Cash Cow?).

Cisco is already a major player in this space with its Cisco Security Agent (CSA) product, although, unlike HP’s offering, this uses a software agent installed on client devices. HP claims that, by not relying on an agent, virus throttling reduces the number of upgrades that users need to do.

Cisco declined to provide comment for this article.Nick Lippis, president of Lippis Consulting, believes that announcements like these are the shape of things to come. ”It’s the beginning step,” he says. “HP has started to embed security features deep into the network fabric -- it reduces the licensing costs for anti-virus and also the number of appliances that you need."

So what does this say about the ProCurve networking business in general, and whether it could eventually be spun off? Robert Whiteley, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc., says the way that ProCurve is set up, almost as a separate division in itself, could make this a possibility.

How likely is this in reality, though? “I am not so sure about that,” says Whiteley, pointing to the close links between ProCurve and HP’s Adaptive Enterprise strategy for selling servers and storage (see HP Lands Sun Server Customers).

”The server guys get value from the network guys, and the network guys get value from the server guys,” he says. “It pays to have a single vision from the application and the server level right down to the network.”

— James Rogers, Site Editor, Next-Gen Data Center Forum0