Mirantis acquires TCP Cloud in continuous delivery push for OpenStack deployments

OpenStack distribution provider Mirantis has set its sights on stopping the digital transformation efforts of enterprises being held back by outdated infrastructure through its acquisition of Prague-based TCP Cloud.

The 30-strong startup specialises in the provision of managed services for OpenStack deployments, but it is the company’s MK.20 technology that prompted Mirantis to hit the acquisition trail for the first time and agree to buy the firm.

Once integrated into the Mirantis distribution of OpenStack, MK.20 means the firm’s customers will no longer have to upgrade their datacentres to the latest version of the open source cloud platform every six months, as updates to the software will be rolled out incrementally.

Speaking to Computer Weekly, Mirantis CEO Alex Freedland said this means the digital transformation efforts of its customers will not be held back by any shortcomings in the performance of their underlying infrastructure.

“The main benefit of using a cloud infrastructure is that it enables people to innovate faster, and the people who develop workloads and applications are delivering innovation continuously, and need to ensure their infrastructure can support their requirements,” he said.

“One of the challenges we have seen in the early days of OpenStack is some of the innovators want more features that are coming into the release, but getting it delivered into the infrastructure in the old, traditional legacy enterprise way is becoming difficult.”

To reinforce this point, Freedland points to the way the likes of VMware, Oracle and Red Hat approach the development of their infrastructure software products, which often involves years in development before making their way into production environments.

“They deliver their technology with one-to-three year development cycles, and the innovation at the infrastructure level comes every one, two, three years as a result,” he said.

Freedland claims the technology Mirantis stands to acquire is around nine months ahead of its own research and development efforts in this area, which was one of the reasons why the company was keen to acquire it.

“We constantly look at the market for tech-centric acquisitions that will enable us to deliver what our customers need, and with TCP Cloud it is allowing us to expedite closing the gap between what we offer and what our customers need,” he said.