Cloud Sidekick Delivers Commercial Data Center Automation Solution to Complement Offering

ATLANTA, GA--(Marketwired - Apr 9, 2013) - Cloud Sidekick, a pioneer in providing cloud automation software, today announced the general availability of Maestro 1.13, a new IT automation and orchestration platform geared toward traditional enterprise organizations seeking "cloudy" automation practices and principles. Maestro 1.13 is an on-premise application provisioning and IT orchestration solution that automates self-service provisioning, management and deprovisioning of complex applications across both cloud and data center infrastructure. Cloud Sidekick also announced today the beta release of its PeopleSoft Extender Beta Development Program.

Practices and principles developed in infrastructure clouds are finding their way into traditional data centers as IT organizations seek new cost-effective ways to manage mature application lifecycles. Complex, distributed applications have been resistant to automation due to their legacy architectures, multiple services/tiers and high operational dependencies. Delivering service orchestration is the best path toward removing time consuming, error-prone and expensive manual provisioning processes. Maestro leverages Cloudy-IT automation practices and principles within traditional enterprise data centers.

"Cloud-based applications typically employ automated administration solutions that include application deployment template files to document configuration and automate provisioning, self-service portals to empower application owners and robust open-API interfaces that allow automation to be initiated from any development platform," said Dennis Ehle, CEO, Cloud Sidekick. "Because most enterprise applications are not currently running within a public or private cloud, we've engineered Maestro to provide robust automation across the full spectrum of bare-metal, virtualized hardware and cloud-based infrastructure."

"Significantly reducing the number of manual touch points surrounding ERP applications is a key component of our forward-looking strategy," said Richard Merwin, ERP Research and Development, North Carolina State University. "These apps drive the greatest operational costs and present the greatest opportunity in terms of forward agility and efficiency gains."

Maestro 1.13 provides deeper support for complex application provisioning across the entire IT Virtualization Spectrum. Key Maestro 1.13 features include:

Web-based User Interface -- A new graphical user interface enables self-service provisioning, management and de-provisioning of complex distributed application deployments. A comprehensive ACL-based security model limits deployments users have access to and actions that can be initiated.

JSON-Based Application Deployment Templates -- Maestro's deployment template model is patterned after Amazon's Cloud Formation with additional features essential to provision, scale and manage complex distributed enterprise applications.

Open API Interface -- Maestro takes an "eCommerce-style" approach to IT service delivery, allowing any automation sequence or action to be requested by authenticated user via the REST based API. The Maestro API provides application developers and system administrators access to the Automation Service Library via any development technology or platform. Leveraging automation in this fashion reduces the reliance on scripts and "command line access" while providing a comprehensive audit trail of every interaction.

Maestro 1.13 and the PeopleSoft Extender Bundle are built upon Cato, Cloud Sidekick's flagship offering now entering its second year of development and distribution. Maestro 1.3 is available now for download and will be distributed under a commercial license. A full-featured free version is available for limited use under the Maestro Licensing Plan.

New Extender Bundle for PeopleSoft Apps

Cloud Sidekick also announced today the beta availability of its Extender Bundle for PeopleSoft ERP Applications. The bundle includes pre-built Maestro template files along with a variety of automation sequences, actions and monitors.

"As a conglomerate of complex, distributed software tiers, PeopleSoft applications have traditionally been resistant to automation," said Lorne Kaufman, ERP Automation and Virtualization Strategist, Cloud Sidekick. "However, advancements in programmatic virtualization platforms and cloud-based infrastructure have given rise to whole new set of automation use-cases for PeopleSoft application owners. With Maestro and the Open Source PeopleSoft Extender, admins and developers have access to fully-automated application workflows via a self-service portal or the open REST AP."

The PeopleSoft Extender Bundle is freely distributed under the Apache License (2.0). If you would like to participate in the PeopleSoft Extender Beta Development Program please contact us at beta@cloudsideick.com.

About Cloud Sidekick

Cloud Sidekick delivers advanced virtualization and cloud automation solutions for enterprise applications. We help our clients leverage best practices from cloud provisioning, configuration management and application lifecycle management to deliver increased system agility, flexibility and reliability while reducing IT costs. To learn more about Cato, Maestro and the PeopleSoft Extender Beta Development Program, please call 678-251-4205 or visit http://www.cloudsidekick.com.