Lately, it seems, quite a few technology players are jumping on the composable infrastructure bandwagon, claiming that their take on a modern infrastructure is a truly composable one. I beg to differ. Upon inspection, many of these offerings appear to be piecemeal efforts dedicated to some part of the infrastructure, rather than the whole. To call them composable infrastructure, then, is a contradiction in terms–an oxymoron along the lines of an open secret or a definite maybe.

Historically, computer systems have been designed with a focus on optimizing application performance. The ability to run applications faster is obviously an important attribute of IT infrastructure. Yet, in recent years, customers have begun looking more closely at optimizing the speed of service delivery. In this new paradigm, IT is transforming from a cost center to a profit center by creating new revenue streams with sleek mobile-first and user-friendly big data applications. Since faster time to market means profits sooner, time to market is becoming a critical metric.