Red Hat Enterprise Linux is coming to the Nutanix Cloud Platform — here’s what you need to know

Red Hat has expanded its collaboration with hybrid multi-cloud specialist Nutanix in a move that will see Red Hat Enterprise Linux incorporated into the Nutanix Cloud Platform. 

Nutanix will leverage Enterprise Linux for traditional operating system capabilities to help drive innovation across hybrid cloud multi environments, as well as allow Nutanix to concentrate on its own IP.

The Nutanix Cloud Platform is designed to provide users with a single platform for running applications and data across hybrid multi-cloud endpoints, complete with self-healing nodes, natively integrated storage, as well as the ability to eliminate unused compute and storage resources.

The platform runs on Nutanix AOS, which bundles together the components of a traditional operating system with additional services and packages. Thanks to the expanded collaboration with Red Hat, AOS will now leverage Red Hat Enterprise Linux for its operating system capabilities to enable Nutanix to focus on the novel intellectual property delivered by Nutanix AOS.

In an announcement, Red Hat said the move will deliver a more consistent cloud operating model for customers running applications and data across hybrid multi-cloud endpoints.

“From virtualized and cloud-native applications to AI and edge workloads, a trusted, more consistent and comprehensive operating system foundation remains a critical component of the technology stack,” explained Stefanie Chiras, senior vice president of Partner Ecosystem Success at Red Hat.

“Red Hat Enterprise Linux has served as an enterprise-ready innovation catalyst for decades, and we’re pleased for the world’s leading enterprise Linux platform to underpin the expansion of our existing collaboration with Nutanix.”

Red Hat said its Enterprise Linux platform offers direct access to dedicated, enterprise-grade Linux experts, alongside enhanced stability for hybrid cloud infrastructure for more consistent management and scaling of cloud-native workloads from on-premises data centers to multiple public clouds. 

Customers can also benefit from Red Hat’s security capabilities and product security and security incident response teams.

As part of the freshly expanded collaboration, Nutanix will also contribute to CentOS Stream and work with both Red Hat and the open source community on hypervisor functionality, networking, and storage performance for emerging AI workloads on Enterprise Linux.

As a result, Nutanix said it will be able to contribute to future distributions of the platform to drive adoption of “more performant applications on the Nutanix Cloud Platform.”

“Nutanix and Red Hat are in a unique position to help customers manage the ongoing market disruptions,” commented Thomas Cornely, senior vice president of product management at Nutanix.

“We’re excited to strengthen our product and go to market partnership with Red Hat to further build on each other’s strengths and enable enterprise customers to make the most of opportunities around cloud, modern application platforms, and AI."