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BMC on Monday agreed to buy data-center automation company BladeLogic in a stock and cash deal value at about $800 million.

BMC, which offers automation tools for monitoring and managing IT systems, will combine its software with BladeLogic’s more targeted product line, which helps companies provision, configure and manage the servers in their data centers. BladeLogic’s products are already integrated into most elements of the BMC platform, according to BMC’s president and chief executive officer Bob Beauchamp.

“Organizations around the world will spend more than $140 billion dollars this year running data centers,” said Beauchamp in announcing the deal. “Automation is the only way IT can bring this spending under control and still meet the reliability and time-to-market requirements of their businesses.”

Stephen Elliot, a research director for IDC's Enterprise Systems Management Software Service, agreed with Beauchamp about the ability of automation tools to help IT managers control costs and said the deal fills a significant gap in BMC’s product portfolio.

Elliot posted the following analysis to IDC’s Web site:

“For most IT organizations, there are increasing pressures to do more with less; data center automation solutions often accomplish this objective. BladeLogic has sold well into enterprise accounts that require compressing infrastructure provisioning cycles, application change controls, and compliance assurance. BladeLogic has developed a solid product portfolio through roles-based controls, granular change and configuration visibility, and application release management,” he said.

“This deal fills a significant technology need in BMC's Service Automation Portfolio; now further integrations across the BMC portfolio must be developed to drive automated processes; notably with BMC Configuration Automation for Networks (network configuration), BMC Run Book Automation (task-based processes), BMC Configuration Manager for Clients, BMC Remedy Change Management Application, BMC Asset Management, and the BMC Transaction Management portfolio. BMC and BladeLogic customers should add BladeLogic to the shortlist for data center automation and pressure BMC to provide product roadmap integrations across the portfolio. BladeLogic offers BMC the opportunity to add mainframe support via BladeLogic capabilities, this could become a key differentiator for customers. Customers should expect BMC to fill the storage configuration gap either through acquisition or partnership. Customers should expect additional resources from BMC for BladeLogic product development, sales support and coverage, and marketing. Strategically, BMC has acquired a set of products that can serve as a catalyst for larger system integration deals across compliance, data center automation, and application lifecycle management.”

Comments (1)

	1. 03-24-2008 18:37
	BMC wasted no time in responding to HP's acquisition of Opsware. If, as John McCormick mentions, BMC re-aligns their overall portfolio to take advantage of this software merger then they can re-attain a "Premier" provider position in the data center automation space.     Data Center automation is a top priority now with many CIO's. If BMC is one of the top players in 2009 and beyond, they could be attractive to a major (IBM ?) as an acquistion themselves. Registered

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