Unlock new opportunities: Why Image mode is a game-changer for Red Hat partners

Image mode for Red Hat® Enterprise Linux® offers a simple, consistent approach to build, deploy, and manage Red Hat Enterprise Linux using familiar container technologies. As one of the many innovative features of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10, Image mode is not just a new capability; it's a strategic opportunity for Red Hat partners to simplify and reduce the cost associated with application development, deployment, and lifecycle management in product environments—yours or your end customers'.

At its core, Image mode takes full advantage of your CI/CD investments by integrating your infrastructure and application into one immutable image that you can manage—similar to containerized application management today—reducing the time and effort needed to deliver an operating environment to a public cloud, an edge deployment, and everything in between.  

The universal advantages: Core benefits for all partners

Image mode introduces several powerful advantages that benefit users in the partner ecosystem:

• Accelerate time to market: By integrating the operating system (OS) into standard container workflows, you can utilize DevOps and CI/CD practices for the entire stack, delivering solutions faster while simplifying your lifecycle management. Building OS images via Containerfiles and automating with pipelines becomes standard practice.
• Enhance security: Image mode utilizes immutable system images, significantly reducing the attack surface for both the OS and the application while also minimizing configuration drift. With only /etc and /var being writable, the operating system and application(s) are protected, enhancing the overall security posture. This aligns with modern DevSecOps principles and uses the trusted Red Hat Enterprise Linux software supply chain.
• Streamline operations: Benefit from automated updates (optional) and simple rollbacks, similar to managing smartphone updates. The bootc tool manages updates by pulling new image versions and rebooting, offering transactional updates and easy recovery.
• Simplify appliance creation: Easily combine the OS, applications, and drivers into a single, bootable artifact. This dramatically simplifies the development and delivery of software or hardware appliances, making them deployable across diverse infrastructures using tools like bootc-image-builder.
   

Tailored opportunities for your business model 

Image mode for Red Hat Enterprise Linux provides distinct opportunities that are aligned with specific partner business models: 

Managed Service Providers (MSPs) & System Integrators (SIs) can: 

• Reduce operational costs & consolidate operations: Take advantage of automated updates and rollbacks to simplify client deployment, patching, and recovery processes for your entire software stack. This operational efficiency translates directly into cost savings and a more streamlined service delivery.
• Improve SLA delivery: Minimize downtime associated with updates and ensure more consistent, reliable service for your clients that directly contributes to, meets, and exceeds Service-Level Agreements (SLAs). 

Resellers can: 

• Create new revenue streams: When you add or extend your DevOps practice to traditional system administration teams, Image mode presents a significant upskilling opportunity. Offer new software and services focused on helping customers design and implement CI/CD and GitOps workflows that now encompass the OS as part of your current workflow. 

Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) can: 

• Build and deploy solutions faster: Increase time-to-value by codifying setup instructions and dependencies within a Containerfile/Dockerfile. This simplifies deployment for you, your customers, and business partners in a cloud marketplace or on-premises, allowing them to quickly align the solution with their specific requirements. 
   

Embrace the future

Image mode for Red Hat Enterprise Linux is a powerful tool for the Red Hat partner ecosystem. By including the operating system into your container-centric workflows, you can unlock significant efficiencies, strengthen security, generate new service opportunities, and deliver solutions faster.

We encourage all our partners to explore the capabilities of Image mode for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Investigate how this innovative approach, built on familiar container tooling and the trusted foundation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, can strengthen your offerings and accelerate your business growth.

You can give it a try today or test it in our lab.