An introduction to Eduserv's UMF Cloud Pilot scheme for higher education. Eduserv has created the Education Cloud as part of the university modernisation fund cloud projects. This presentation reviews the cloud infrastructure and pricing created for the cloud. This presentation was delivered by Andy Powell at our shared services in HE event on 24 November 2011.

1. UMF Cloud Pilot
andy.powell@eduserv.org.uk
@andypowe11

2. What is the UMF?
• University Modernisation Fund
• £12.5 million from HEFCE to encourage uptake
of shared services in HE
– efficiency and value for money as key drivers
• channelled thru the JISC Shared Services
and the Cloud programme
– research and administrative computing
– JANET Brokerage, DCC and Eduserv
– 4 SaaS projects
– RMAS, DARE and ESB
– running until end of March 2012
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

3. What is the UMF Cloud Pilot?
• compute and storage cloud for HE and FE
• infrastructure as a service (IaaS)
• designed to address the major concerns of HEIs
– data remains in the UK at all times
– operated for the long-term benefit
of the UK academic sector
– integrated with the JANET network
– lower the costs associated
with IT provisioning
• a ‘community cloud’ for education
• built on our Community Cloud
Infrastructure
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

4. Delivered by Eduserv
• not-for-profit IT services company
• best known in HEIs for OpenAthens and CHEST
• web hosting and development for government
• 20 year sustainable track record of growth
– >3.5m registered users of Eduserv-based services
– 115 staff - turnover of £16.5m in 2009/10
– new datacentre in Swindon specifically for
education and the public sector
• charitable mission to encourage
the effective use of ICT in
‘public good’ organisations
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

5. Delivered from
• our Swindon Data Centre
– capacity and power for >600 racks of infrastructure
– modular design
– PUE efficiency design of <1.4
– 10 Gbit/s JANET backbone connectivity via
new JANET PoP
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

6. Hardware
• Cisco UCS blade infrastructure
– dual 6-core 3.06GHz processors with 64GB RAM
– initial deployment will scale to >1,500 cores, 8 TB of RAM
• Isilon storage
– clustered NAS solution with near-SAN performance
– initial deployment will scale to 10PB usable
• connectivity
– 2-tier Cisco switched network (core and
distribution)
– fully resilient with no single point of
failure (including dual path to
JANET PoP)
– all ports running at 10 Gbit/s
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

7. Our offer
• vCloud Compute
• OpenStack Compute
• VM Storage
• File Storage
• JANET Connectivity
all accessed via a self-service portal
integrated with the UK Access
Management Federation with possibility
of long term tape archiving in the future
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

8. Typical use-cases
• vCloud Compute
– good fit with local vSphere provision
– burst capacity at times of high demand
– DR facility
• OpenStack Compute
– research computing
– undergraduate teaching
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

9. Timescales
• now
– vCloud Compute ‘lab’ environment for use by UMF-funded
SaaS projects
• Jan 2012
– vCloud Compute general availability
• April 2012
– self-service Web portal
– full billing infrastructure
– OpenStack Compute availability
– File Storage beta
• …beyond
– storage ‘preservation’ tier
– multiple datacentres
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

10. Pricing models
• 2 pricing models
– PAYG (pay for what you provision/use)
– Virtual Datacentre (pay for what you reserve)
• in mobile phone terms, PAYG vs. Pay Monthly
• why PAYG?
– flexibility
• why Virtual Datacentre?
– predictability
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

11. Billing
• PAYG billed monthly in arrears against pre-
registered credit card
• Virtual Datacentre billed monthly or annually
against pre-registered credit card or by invoice
– annual tariff billed in advance
– discounts of up to 30% for annual
commitment
– over-usage billed at PAYG rates
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

12. Pricing
• 3 key principles
– return on investment by/for the community
– sustainability
– competitive
• prices just announced
• all prices quoted ex-VAT
• we will offer an ‘introductory tier’
( but only for institutions)
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

13. Concluding remarks
• we’d welcome feedback on:
– the cloud platforms we support
– pricing and billing models
– anything else…
• get in touch at umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk
(where we are also blogging our progress)
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

14. Questions?
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

15. umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

16. vCloud Compute PAYG (Linux)
£/hour 1 vCPU 2 vCPU 4 vCPU 8 vCPU 24 vCPU
0.5 GB £0.012 £0.014 £0.015 £0.016 £0.017
1 GB £0.024 £0.028 £0.031 £0.032 £0.034
2 GB £0.048 £0.056 £0.062 £0.065 £0.067
4 GB £0.096 £0.112 £0.123 £0.130 £0.135
8 GB £0.192 £0.224 £0.246 £0.259 £0.269
16 GB £0.383 £0.448 £0.492 £0.519 £0.538
48 GB £1.150 £1.345 £1.477 £1.556 £1.615
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

17. vCloud Compute PAYG (Linux)
£/month 1 vCPU 2 vCPU 4 vCPU 8 vCPU 24 vCPU
0.5 GB £8.75 £10.23 £11.23 £11.84 £12.28
1 GB £17.50 £20.45 £22.47 £23.67 £24.56
2 GB £34.99 £40.91 £44.94 £47.34 £49.12
4 GB £69.98 £81.81 £89.88 £94.68 £98.25
8 GB £139.96 £163.63 £179.75 £189.37 £196.50
16 GB £279.92 £327.26 £359.50 £378.74 £393.00
48 GB £839.77 £981.77 £1,078.51 £1,136.22 £1,179.00
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

18. vCloud Compute PAYG (Windows)
£/hour 1 vCPU 2 vCPU 4 vCPU 8 vCPU 24 vCPU
0.5 GB £0.014 £0.017 £0.018 £0.019 £0.020
1 GB £0.028 £0.034 £0.037 £0.039 £0.040
2 GB £0.057 £0.067 £0.074 £0.078 £0.081
4 GB £0.114 £0.134 £0.148 £0.156 £0.162
8 GB £0.228 £0.268 £0.295 £0.312 £0.324
16 GB £0.456 £0.536 £0.591 £0.623 £0.648
48 GB £1.367 £1.608 £1.772 £1.870 £1.943
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

19. OpenStack Compute PAYG
Linux £/hour Linux £/month Windows £/hour
£0.014 £0.017
Micro (0.5GHz+1GB) £10.12
£0.038 £27.43 £0.047
Small (1GHz+2GB)
£0.091 £0.113
Medium (2GHz+4GB) £66.69
£0.205 £0.254
Large (4GHz+8GB) £149.51
£0.436 £0.541
Extra large £318.26
£1.308 £1.622
XL high memory £954.78
£0.456 £0.565
XL high CPU £332.52
£1.367 £1.695
XXL (24GHz+48GB) £997.56
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

20. VM and File Storage PAYG
• 6.7p per GB per month (£828.34/TB/year)
• VM Storage is billed according to the average
provisioned storage over the billing period (one
month).
• File Storage is billed according to the average
utilised storage over the billing period (one
month).
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

21. Connectivity PAYG
• JANET Data transfer: Free
• 1st public IP address: Free
• Additional public IP addresses: 0.5p per IP
address per hour
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

22. vCloud Compute Virtual Datacentre
Very Small Small Medium Large Very Large
CPU Reserved 10 20 40 80 200
(GHz)
Memory 20 40 80 160 400
Reserved (GB)
Storage (TB) 1 4 10 20 50
Public IP 1 1 2 4 10
addresses
Approx Virtual 15-30 30-60 60-120 120-240 240-500
Machines
Total price /
£440.00 £990.00 £2,080.00 £4,080.00 £9,980.00
month
Total price / year
£5,070.00 £10,940.00 £21,790.00 £45,740.00 £93,120.00
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk

23. Introductory Tier
• for new institutional customers
– a small Virtual Datacentre for two months
umfcloudpilot.eduserv.org.uk