HPE Snaps Up Cloud Metering Specialist Cloud Cruiser

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Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) is acquiring Cloud Cruiser, a cloud resource consumption software specialist that enables accurate cloud metering and billing, for an undisclosed amount, the companies announced this week.

HPE is Cloud Cruiser’s largest customer and licenses its technology as part of scalable IT infrastructure service that enables customers to pay for IT capacity using a consumption-based pricing model. “Our relationship with HP started in 2010 as they became our first partner, first product integration, and our first joint customer win,” explained Dave Zabrowski, co-founder and CEO of Cloud Cruiser, in a Jan. 23 blog post pertaining to the deal.

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“Fast forward a few years, and HPE is now one of Cloud Cruiser’s largest customers, utilizing Cloud Cruiser to power Flexible Capacity, a consumption based, pay-as-you-go service,” Zabrowski continued. “Over this time, our teams worked together collaboratively, which I only expect to deepen as we become one.”

In his own take on the matter, Scott Weller, senior vice president of HPE Technology Services Support, called his company’s Flexible Capacity business “a strategic and high-growth component of HPE’s Technology Services portfolio” that combines as-a-service cloud economics with on-premise IT infrastructure. “This reduces the risk of organizations investing too much – or too little – in IT, eliminates unused capacity, and frees up valuable IT resources for new value-adding projects.”

Bringing Cloud Cruiser into the fold provides accurate metering and billing for IT services delivered via public, private or hybrid clouds. Aside from HPE, current customers include Microsoft, Accenture and TD Bank.

After the transaction is completed, HPE plans to add Cloud Cruiser to its Technology Services Support unit’s Data Center Care portfolio of offerings. Zabrowski, who once served as general manager of HP’s Enterprise Computer Organization, will report directly to Weller.

The Cloud Cruiser deal comes nearly a week after HPE announced it had acquired SimpliVity, hyperconverged infrastructure provider, for $650 million.

SimpliVity specializes in hyperconverged systems for virtualized environments. Emerging from stealth in 2012, the Westborough, Mass.-based data storage company supplies systems called OmniCubes that pack compute and storage into a 2U appliance, complete with practically all the components required to spin up a cloud-like environments, including hypervisor, backup, replication and cloud gateway functionality.

“This transaction expands HPE’s software-defined capability and fits squarely within our strategy to make Hybrid IT simple for customers. More and more customers are looking for solutions that bring them secure, highly resilient, on-premises infrastructure at cloud economics,” said Meg Whitman, President and CEO of HPE, in a Jan. 17 statement.

Pedro Hernandez is a contributing editor at Datamation. Follow him on Twitter @ecoINSITE.