Modularity, Standards, and Cloud Services: HPE and OVH Cloud Partnership

Author: JBK (JP), Chief Technologist for Service Providers, HPE; Miroslav Claba, VP R&D, OVH Cloud Collection: 2025 OCP Global Summit - Expo Hall Sessions

Summary

HPE and OVH Cloud jointly present their partnership approach to modular hardware and cloud service delivery. HPE advocates for pushing value higher in the server stack by standardizing lower-level interfaces through OCP projects like DC-MHS (Data Center Modular Hardware System) and open-source firmware (OpenBMC, LinuxBoot). The thesis is that once fundamental hardware interfaces (PCIe pin-outs, sideband lanes, etc.) are standardized, engineering resources can focus on differentiated services rather than re-solving basic integration problems with each server generation.

HPE identifies key market trends: exponential data generation, carbon reduction pressures, privacy/security concerns, and technical impacts including latency (critical for microservices/cloud-native computing), AI/ML (including software development acceleration), technical diversity (ARM, RISC-V, chiplets alongside x86), and CI/CD development models. The modularity vision extends from hardware into software, with the goal that individual server modules can be upgraded asynchronously -- replacing compute modules for new workloads without refreshing the entire server.

OVH Cloud, a European cloud service provider operating 44 data centers worldwide across 4 continents, partners with HPE for local zone deployment (bringing security near customers), on-premises cloud platforms (addressing European data sovereignty requirements), and SAP HANA workloads. The partnership model allows OVH Cloud to redistribute compute capacity for different workloads by upgrading specific modules rather than whole servers, passing efficiency savings to customers while reducing carbon footprint.