DENVER, Colo., Nov. 19, 2019 — Today at SC19, Bright Computing, a global leader in cluster and cloud infrastructure automation software, announced the launch of “Easy8” – a program designed to put their award-winning Bright Cluster Manager software in the hands of every organization working with high-performance Linux clusters.  Easy8 offers the full-featured Bright Cluster Manager software for up to 8 nodes at no charge and is available immediately from the Bright Computing website.  Bright also announced the launch of its new “BEACON” user community, which is designed to provide Bright customers and Easy8 users with a free forum where they can access technical content, share experiences, ask/answer questions, exchange ideas, and suggest product enhancements.  With Easy8 and BEACON, Bright Computing has set the stage for high-performance Linux clusters to become the cornerstone of corporate data centers by enabling organizations to quickly build and manage the infrastructure necessary for the new generation of compute-intensive applications that are making their way into the data center.

“Whether you are experienced or new to Linux clusters, the reality is that they are inherently complex to build, troubleshoot, and maintain with hundreds or thousands of discrete compute, storage, and networking elements that must all work in unison,” said Bill Wagner, CEO of Bright Computing. “With the Easy8 program, we’re giving every organization the ability to use our software free of charge for up to 8 nodes to demonstrate how powerful and beneficial Bright Cluster Manager software can be for their business.”

Why Now?

More than ever, the circumstances and use cases necessitating an easier way to build and manage Linux clusters are all around us:

• High-performance Linux clusters are becoming pervasive, driven by machine learning, data analytics, the creation of private clouds, and growth in traditional High-Performance Computing (HPC)
• The high cost of sustained use of public clouds in HPC is causing organizations to pursue hybrid clustered infrastructure spanning on-premise and cloud
• Industries with no prior experience in HPC – now thrust into it via Artificial Intelligence (AI) – lack the knowhow to build and maintain the high-performance clusters they now need
• Organizations once staffed with people that are skilled and knowledgeable in building clusters are finding it difficult and risky to rely on dwindling staff to build and manage clusters manually
• Organizations graduating their AI programs from the proof-of-concept phase to the scale-out production phase must now grapple with the realities of cluster management
• Organizations that see a broad need for high-performance clusters offered as “on-demand” are starting to build HPC-as-a-Service private clouds in their data centers

Every industry and organization on the planet are about to participate in an arms race of sorts using machine learning, HPC, and data analytics to change the world as we know it, with winner-takes-all consequences. The urgency will be unprecedented, and every minute will count in pursuit of the breakthroughs that will define the winners and losers.  In this climate, time to value and IT agility will be an advantage that propels the winners forward, while the losers toil in trying to keep up with the infrastructure needs of their users. That is precisely why Bright is choosing this moment to make Bright Cluster Manager widely available through the Easy8 program; to allow organizations to see how Bright Cluster Manager can become their secret weapon in redefining their business and outmaneuvering their competition at this critical moment in time.

The New BEACON User Community

Bright now has several thousand deployments and users spanning commercial, educational, and public sectors, providing a critical mass of knowledge and passionate users to fuel the interaction necessary for an effective community. For Bright’s commercially supported customers, BEACON will provide added value and supplement the formal customer channel with a collaborative user forum that many have been asking for.

“Bright has a passionate base of customers who actively engage each other at Bright-sponsored community events,” said Dan Kuczkowski, Senior Vice President of Sales at Bright Computing. “With the implementation of the BEACON user community, our customers now have direct access to an online forum where they can engage with thousands of additional users and use cases. This will open the door to collaboration and input on the continued development of our product portfolio in a variety of ways.”

For more information about the Easy8 program and the BEACON user community, please contact us directly at [email protected].

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Source: Bright Computing