Quest KACE

Quest KACE
Private (subsidiary of Quest Software)
Industry Software
Founded February 2003
Founders Rob Meinhardt and Marty Kacin
Headquarters Aliso Viejo, California, United States
Products Systems management
Parent Quest Software
Website www.quest.com/kace

Quest KACE, formerly Dell KACE, is a company that specializes in computer appliances for systems management of information technology equipment. It also provides software for security, application virtualization, and systems management products. Established in 2003, KACE was 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 personnel more efficiently provision, manage, secure and service network-connected devices. In 2007, competitors included Altiris, Novell ZENworks, BigFix, LANDesk, as well as products for other larger companies.[1]

On February 11, 2010, KACE announced its acquisition by Dell.[2] KACE family appliances were then sold by Dell. Later on KACE became part of Dell Software group.

On November 1, 2016, Francisco Partners and Elliot Management acquired the Dell Software Group,[3] which was re-launched as Quest Software and SonicWALL.[4] KACE products are currently part of the Quest portfolio.[5]

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.

KACE Systems Management Appliance

The KACE Systems Management Appliance (formerly the K1000) manages, secures and services network-connected devices.[6]

KACE Systems Deployment Appliance

The KACE Systems Deployment Appliance (formerly the K2000) accelerates the initial provisioning and ongoing administration of system images and driver updates.[7]

Mobile device management

As personal mobile devices, 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),[8] 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 company's acquisition by Dell, KACE appliances were 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,[9] Bomgar remote support[10] or Faronics Deep Freeze application.[11]

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. ↑ "Francisco Partners and Elliott Management to Acquire the Dell Software Group". www.franciscopartners.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  4. ↑ "Francisco Partners and Elliott Management Complete Acquisition of Dell Software Group". www.franciscopartners.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  5. ↑ "KACE is Now Quest Software!". www.kace.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  6. ↑ "KACE Systems Management Appliance (K1000) | Endpoint Management". www.quest.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  7. ↑ "KACE Systems Deployment Appliance (KACE SDA) | Enterprise OS Software Deployment". www.quest.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  8. ↑ "2013 Prediction: BYOD on the Decline?". CIO. November 13, 2012. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
  9. ↑ "How to Integrate SolarWinds NPM and Dell KACE F... |THWACK". thwack.solarwinds.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  10. ↑ Bomgar website:Using Bomgar with Dell Kace, visited: 15 June 2013
  11. ↑ "Faronics and Dell KACE Integration Technical Paper - Faronics". www.faronics.com. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
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