App stores and data center equipment apparently go well together, or at least that’s what some vendors seem to believe. Hewlett-Packard offers an application catalog for its software-denied networking platform and now EMC is jumping on the bandwagon with a new converged infrastructure module that offers– you guessed it – a selection of pre-packaged services that customers can download on demand.

VSPEX Blue, the latest addition to the array giant’s series of integrated reference architectures, implements the EVO:RAIL management stack that VMware unveiled at its annual user conference last August. The software bundle consists of the subsidiary’s hypervisor, storage virtualization platform, logging system and a configuration engine that EMC says can enable administrators to have virtual machines up and running on the appliance 15 minutes after turning on the switch.

That emphasis on ease-of-use reflects the fact that VSPEX Blue is geared toward mid-market companies with limited technology budgets as opposed to the large enterprises that much of the rest of EMC’s converged infrastructure lineup targets. That focus is also more than evident in the specifications of the system, which comes with a relatively humble 14.4 terabytes of capacity, 128 or 192 gigabytes of memory and four blade servers of the customer’s choosing.

That’s enough to support about 100 machines or 250 virtual desktops, which can be increased up to four times in a clustered deployment. There is also a choice between copper- and fiber-based connectivity, but it’s not the hardware that EMC is counting on to lure organizations into buying the system.

Extending the focus on simplicity, VSPEX Blue complements the setup engine with an application marketplace that offers a catalog of pre-packaged services from the storage giant and its partners. The store includes three items on launch, most notably the CloudArray Gateway that EMC obtained through the acquisition of TwinStrata Inc. last July, which enables administrators to manage their infrastructure-as-a-service deployments as if they were physically part of the system.

The service apparently supported a wide range of providers prior to the buyout, but it’s nowhere in sight on the AWS Marketplace, although a description is still there, which suggests that the storage giant is limiting the service to VMware’s public cloud. The other two applications in EMC’s catalog are RecoverPoint for Virtual Machines and vSphere Data Protection Advanced, with more applications set to be added in the future.

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