HP Launches Industry's First SDN App Store, Unleashing New Wave of Networking Innovations

PALO ALTO, CA--(Marketwired - Sep 25, 2014) - HP (NYSE: HPQ) today announced the general availability of the HP SDN App Store, launching a new wave of open, software-defined networking (SDN) innovation for customers and partners.

The HP SDN App Store provides HP's ecosystem partners a go-to-market platform together with consulting and support services that will enable customers to uncover the business value of SDN.

IDC predicts that the market for SDN network applications will reach $1.1 billion by 2017,⁽¹⁾ increasing network application vendors' need for a scalable open marketplace to monetize their innovations. As the first enterprise-grade SDN application ecosystem in the market, the HP SDN App Store redefines the networking business model, offering the developer community a centralized platform connecting to customers around the world. Customers can now easily discover, learn and purchase specific network applications and download them to their environment for testing and live deployment.

"Our customers are eager to transform their network architecture into a competitive advantage, and SDN applications make that possible," said Antonio Neri, senior vice president and general manager, Servers and Networking, HP. "With the HP SDN App Store, we have completed the final piece of the SDN ecosystem by offering a vibrant, robust marketplace of innovations that supports more than 5 million users and provides support to customers as they migrate to SDN."

Redefining an open, SDN-enabled application ecosystem
With major industry technology transitions for enterprises to address, such as security, cloud, mobility and big data, SDN is essential for paving the way to customer success in networking. HP remains focused on building an ecosystem of partners to create solution-driven applications that bring value and simplicity to customers. Examples of these offerings include the HP Virtual Application Networks (VAN) SDN Controller, which has been downloaded more than 3,000 times, and HP SDN Software Development Kit, which has been downloaded more than 5,000 times.

The HP SDN Application Store offers independent software vendors an easy way to bring creative solutions to market, enabling IT managers who embrace SDN architecture to solve their unique network challenges through these applications.

To help customers easily navigate the HP SDN App Store, HP will offer four different categories of applications defined by their support and test process:

• The HP Circle, with applications built and tested exclusively by HP.
• The Premium Circle, containing applications that are top sellers and jointly tested by HP and its partners.
• The Partner Circle, encompassing applications that have been self-tested by HP partners and reviewed by HP.
• The Community Circle, offering open-access and community-supported applications to demonstrate open source and concept SDN applications.

Introducing the first wave of applications