1. A compact peripheral component interconnect (CPCI) system, comprising: a chassis; a circuit board forming a backplane within said chassis; a node card coupled with said circuit board and having a central processing unit (CPU), said CPU running a plurality of applications for managing and accessing devices on said CPCI system; an Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI); an IPMI micro-controller coupled with said circuit board and in communication with said CPU via said IPMI; wherein said IPMI micro-controller and said CPU comprise a plurality of virtual controllers; and wherein each of said plurality of applications running on said CPU can independently access resources on said IPMI micro-controller via said plurality of virtual controllers.