KACE Networks

Dell KACE
Private (subsidiary of Dell)
Industry Software
Founded February 2003
Headquarters Mountain View, California, United States
Key people
 Rob Meinhardt, Chairman and CEO
Marty Kacin, President and CTO
Products Systems management
Website www.kace.com

Dell KACE is a company that specializes in computer appliances for systems management of information technology equipment. They also provide software for security, application virtualization, and systems management products. Established in 2003, KACE is headquartered in Mountain View, California with offices in Europe and Asia.

History

KACE was started in 2003 when Rob Meinhardt and Marty Kacin founded and self-funded the company for over two years. KACE subsequently received venture capital funding from Sigma Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, and Focus Ventures. KACE developed appliances designed to help IT departments manage their networks and desktop and server computers more efficiently. In 2007, competitors included Altiris, BigFix, LANDesk, as well as products for other larger companies.[1]

On February 11, 2010, KACE announced their acquisition by Dell.[2] KACE family appliances were then sold by Dell.

Products

All KACE products are sold as computer appliances. These systems are delivered as 19-inch rack servers or as VMware ESX virtual machines. Except for initial network settings via a console login, all communication with the product is done using the graphical user interface using a Web browser.

Software inventory and distribution

The KBox 1xxx series are physical or virtual systems management appliances that offer computer-inventory system, software provisioning system and helpdesk-application. Other services offered by the 1000 series include: software-inventory, software-provisioning, support-desk system including ticketing system and remote-control option, update/patch-deployment (OS and application patches) and software asset management. Support for managing virtual machines was announced in August 2007.[3][4]

Operating system deployment

The Kbox2xxx appliances offer operating-system deployment. Via Preboot Execution Environment (PXE Boot), a computer without any operating system can automatically install a Microsoft Windows or Apple OS X operating system via either image-based deployment or script-based automated OS installation.

Mobile device management

As personal mobile devices as smart-phones and tablets are getting used in enterprise environments, including allowing them some level of access to the enterprise IT infrastructure under the term bring your own device (BYOD),[5] KACE anticipated a demand to manage mobile devices in a similar way as laptops, workstations or servers.

Overlap

Some of the facilities offered in the application-distribution systems are also to some level available in the OS deployment systems: for example, installation of some standard applications as part of an OS deployment. Both systems do offer inventory options.

Architecture

Since before the acquisition by Dell, the K-series appliances are sold as physical Dell PowerEdge servers with open-source software technologies. All appliances are also available as virtual appliances that can run on VMware ESX or VMware ESXi. Trial versions of the appliances can also run on VMware Player.

KACE uses FreeBSD and all collected data is stored in a number of mySQL databases. Although all management of the device and the data in the system goes (only) via the web-gui users have developed their own interfaces with other management systems by accessing the databases directly. It is also possible to integrate a Kace appliance in third party IT management suites, such as SolarWinds NPM system Orion,[6] Bomgar remote support[7] or Faronics Deep Freeze application.[8]

References

  1. ↑ Matt Hines (October 18, 2007). "IT security and management on collision course". Info World. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
  2. ↑ Andrew Nusca (February 11, 2010). "Dell acquires KACE; expands systems management to mid-size business". ZDNet blog. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
  3. ↑ Denise Dubie (August 27, 2007). "Kace appliance tackles virtual management". Network World. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
  4. ↑ Antone Gonsalves (August 27, 2007). "KACE Launches Appliance For Managing Virtual, Physical Servers". Information Week. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
  5. ↑ 2013 "2013 Prediction: BYOD on the Decline?". CIO. November 13, 2012. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
  6. ↑ Technical whitepaper: Solarwinds/Kace integration, 2011. downloaded: 16 June 2013
  7. ↑ Bomgar website:Using Bomgar with Dell Kace, visited: 15 June 2013
  8. ↑ Faronics and Kace Integration Reference, 31 May 2012. Visited: 16 June 2013

External links