What where they thinking ? HPE went shopping

I’m hearing lots of things from various people I know about HPEs - decisions regarding their latest acquisitions and quite frankly I’m confused as well , Will HPE take another product and tank it ? Or is there any actual strategy.

Let’s start with SimpliVity which in my opinion had potential to be the leading company in the HyperConverged area ,but thanks to Nutanix that already did many of the ground work and matureness of the product , made Nutanix without a doubt the one to beat. I believe that HPE acquired SimpliVity mostly because Nutanix was already too high in valuation ,they were around $2B+ with a niche product in a niche market so it was too risky for them to pay this I think. HPE wanted to be in the playground of HyperConverged and instead of trying doing something with their existing VSA technology they went on a more mature product I believe and it costed them only $650M. The additional benefit is if you look at the entire stack of SimpliVity product, it has specific components that HPE can benefit from providing it via HPE hardware which will bring the cost of the product maybe to a lower point like servers etc. Time will tell but I do think that under the HPE umbrella it will be commoditized rather uplifted as a brand.

Now to the second and big surprise from my side , Nimble was acquired for $1.2B , which is …WOW! I mean I do love this company, I think that they have done lots of waves in the storage industry so I can’t understand the move from the Nimble side on selling it so early .Said that , I do understand of course why HPE would want them. Why you think? because they are a good company? NO , NO , NO , because as I see it now , they don’t know what to do with the existing storage division and especially HP 3Par that was also acquired couple years ago that currently just isn’t getting momentum . Nimble in my opinion are doing many right decision from all aspects of thinking regarding the entire line of product , monitoring ,forecast analytics , support etc. . Now that they sold I do believe they will be facing the same destiny as the 3Par did although I hope I’m wrong . #HPE Great move from you side , Nimble — good luck!

Last but not least — It’s only rumors but what for rumors they are . This company is my favorite and I think they are defiantly the top innovators from product point of view , I’m talking about — VEEAM.
In the latest days there are rumors about possible move of HPE on also acquiring the Russian-American based company which is an amazingly smart move for HPE. With Veeam leading the DP products in their portfolio and going Veeam & StoreOnce together it’s a brilliant strategy in the future for them . Veeam from the other hand what can I say ?! Let’s hope here also that the dynamics of you will not be altered.

To sum it up I believe HPE are making big moves from their part and do good for companies that should grow their stack of solutions ,But and it’s a big one, I do hope they will stop being a graveyard for companies and actually do more with the products.