Category Archives: Storage as a Service

Box, Enterprise IT, News & Analysis, Salesforce, Software as a service, Storage as a Service

Box and Salesforce unite for integrated in-app file management

mergerSalesforce and Box have worked together to integrate their respective cloud offerings so you can use files stored in Box without having to exit Salesforce. To this end they have jointly created a new Salesforce Files Connect for Box service, along with a Box software development kit (SDK) for Salesforce.

The Salesforce Files Connect for Box means that users of the former’s customer relationship management system can search, browse, access and share Box files from any device without coming out of their Salesforce app or jeopardising the existing access and security granted in Box.

The two firms claim the integration will make users of each service more productive, as content managed on Box can easily be connected directly to records, users and groups within Salesforce. The newly created cohesion between the two apps means that two Salesforce users can now collaborate together on material that is stored in the Box system.

The Box SDK for Salesforce aims to give developers license to use Box’s content management within any app built on Salesforce App Cloud. It also allows developers to embed Box’s content management functions within the Salesforce system. The upshot is that it gives Salesforce users mope options on the type of content they can use, even from specialised industries like financial services, healthcare and government.

Salesforce Files Connect for Box is currently being tested out by select customers and is expected on general release in Summer 2016. Box SDK for Salesforce is currently available for free on Github for developers.

Integrations like this help make it easier for enterprises to move to the cloud, said Box CEO Aaron Levie.

“As companies get more mobile, social and connected, it’s critical that anyone can instantly access the information they need, no matter where it is stored,” said Nasi Jazayeri, executive VP of Community Cloud at Salesforce.

Content & Applications, News & Analysis, Storage as a Service, Western Digital

Data consumption outgrows personal storage capabilities – research

Cloud storageThe sheer weight of data is growing far too fast for personal storage devices to cope, says new research which will delight device makers and disappoint cloud storage providers, if true. The study suggests that the majority of consumers are stressed by the prospect of deleting their content to overcome capacity issues. The only way to cope with the newly identified syndrome, Post Deletion Stress Disorder (PDSD), is to buy more capacity. However, they want to own the device that stores their data, rather than rent it, says Western Digital.

According to the independent study conducted on storage device maker WD’s behalf, 56% of UK consumers have been forced to delete content from a technology device, due to capacity issues, and regretted it. Researcher Vanson Bourne, which talked to 1,000 UK consumers, found that 7% are running out of storage on their mobile daily, 16% are reaching full memory at least weekly and 31% run out of storage capacity at least monthly.

However, given a choice, consumers generally prefer to own storage outright, rather than rent it, it claimed. Meanwhile storage allocations on devices are being pushed with 77% downloading an app to a mobile device at least monthly, and around one third (33%) downloading a feature film to a mobile device this often. Photographs take up the most storage capacity across a range of consumer devices, while 44% of consumers admit they ‘don’t know’ what content is taking up storage capacity on their devices.

With 44% of the survey sample trying to manage on just 64GB of device storage not enough people (just 33%) have invested in an external hard drive to solve their storage problems, says WD a maker of external hard drives. By contrast, just 2% of those surveyed use a paid cloud storage service and only 16% use a free cloud storage service.

“Clearly consumers are sacrificing precious memories and valuable content to make more space on their devices,” said Jim Welsh, general manager of Content Solutions at WD, “we believe consumers will look for external storage solutions that bring more value with features that help them store, share and backup their digital content from mobile devices and computers.”

Channel, News & Analysis, Red Hat, Storage, Storage as a Service

Red Hat launches software defined storage systems that run on commodity hardware

redhat office logoOpen source software vendor Red Hat has launched a portfolio of open, software-defined storage systems which will cut costs by running on commodity hardware. The systems will be sold through a variety of sources across Red Hat’s sales channel.

The logic of selling Red Hat Ceph Storage and Red Hat Gluster Storage system through different channels is to widen the scope of opportunity for Red Hat’s partners, it said. The technology will be made available to any participants in the Red Hat Connect for Business and Red Hat Embedded programmes, as well as all Red Hat Certified Cloud and Service Providers from 2016.

Red Hat Ceph Storage and Red Hat Gluster Storage are open source, software-defined storage systems designed to cater for rapid expansion. They will run on commodity hardware and have durable, programmable architectures the vendor said.

Each is suited for different types of enterprise workloads and similarly enterprise customers will be able to mix and match the Red Hat partners whose skill sets are suited to the technical and vertical market conditions.

Red Hat Advanced and Premier partners are authorised to sell Red Hat Storage solutions, but only if they meet the training requirements for their region’s partner programme via the Red Hat Online Partner Enablement Network (OPEN). Having qualified, however, the resellers can be kept motivated as they benefit from competitive and flexible pricing models. Further service incentives come from opportunities to earn additional margin and recurring revenue.

Red Hat Ceph Storage and Red Hat Gluster Storage subscriptions are scheduled to be available to partners through the Red Hat Embedded Program by the end of 2015. Red Hat Ceph Storage and Red Hat Gluster Storage are scheduled to become available to Red Hat Certified Cloud and Service Providers in 2016.

Training and certification, marketing and sales programs, and technical content for Red Hat Storage solutions will be available to certified partners in the Red Hat Connect for Business Partners portal.

“By making Ceph Storage and Gluster Storage enterprise-procurement friendly, Red Hat is positioning itself as a formidable IT storage supplier,” said Ashish Nadkarni, program director at analyst IDC.

AWS, Cloud Storage, Gemalto, NetApp, News & Analysis, Storage as a Service

Gemalto and NetApp to create secure cloud storage hybrid for AWS customers

Cloud storageSecurity vendor Gemalto and NetApp are to jointly create an integrated, encrypted key management system for securing data for Amazon Web Services (AWS) customers. The aim is to save time and improve security for end users, by simplifying the process of securing virtual data.

The two vendors, both AWS network partners, are to blend Gemalto’s SafeNet Virtual KeySecure and NetApp’s Cloud ONTAP as a unified service to be offered on the AWS Marketplace.

The SafeNet Virtual KeySecure for NetApp Cloud ONTAP (SKNCO) service promises to make storing and encrypting data and applications much easier for companies using virtual environments. The system will pay for itself, claim the vendors, through the productivity gains and raised levels of security created when users enjoy more governance over their stored data.

The SVKNCO creates these benefits, it’s claimed, by centralising management and making it easy to create customisable security policies for data access in the cloud. It achieves this by combining NetApp’s modern storage infrastructure with Gemalto’s SafeNet key management. The hybrid of the two systems can protect customers’ data and encryption keys against unauthorised access, while giving them the most cost effective storage options at all times.

It’s about creating top levels of security, but not at ‘any cost’ according to Todd Moore, VP of Data Encryption Product Management at Gemalto. “AWS users can now turn to NetApp to manage, store and protect their data more confidently, while completely owning their encryption keys,” said Moore.

Meanwhile, data centre infrastructure vendor Nutanix has also announced that its Community Edition is to be made available for AWS customers. The free software tool aims to help AWS customers speed up the evaluation process when weighing their options for buying infrastructure.

3PAR, Flash, HPE, News & Analysis, Storage, Storage as a Service

HP launches 3Par flash storage – building block for all flash data centres

HPHewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has launched new flash storage devices which it claims will bring the day of the all flash data centre and lighting fast cloud services closer.

The HPE 3PAR StoreServ Storage systems will be the data storage blocks in the flash data centres of the future, its claims. When all the memory, storage and processing of data is run on flash technology, data centres will create the most competitive environment possible for cloud services, according to HPE.

HPE has also integrated 3PAR StoreServ with its new HPE StoreOnce and HPE StoreEver product lines to ensure protection and retention keep pace with demand. It is this integration which will speed the progress of modernising data centres, according to HPE, because it means that new and mixed media types can work together in the same array while maintaining performance and enterprise-class resiliency.

Earlier in November the Storage Performance Council testified that a new world record speed was achieved by the 3PAR StoreServ 20850 all-flash array. HPE claims it produced better performance levels than the rival EMC VMAX 400K, but at half the price.

Among the new HPE offerings are a 3PAR Flash Acceleration system for Oracle, 3PAR Online Import software and support for 3d NAND drives.

The Flash Acceleration drive could makes databases perform 75% quicker while enabling legacy systems like EMC VMAX to remain in place, claims HPE. This, it says, is half the price of upgrading the legacy storage system.

3PAR Online Import software makes it easier to move off hard disk drive (HDD)-bound legacy storage, such as EMC, HDS and IBM XIV, and onto flash. Support for 3D NAND drives means that solid state drive (SSD) technology can be installed cheaply.

HPE claims it can save the massive expense involved in buying pure flash systems by creating a flash-optimised design that supports both file and block storage as well as a secondary tier of HDDs.

HPE also announced new systems to help customers as they move away from traditional backup silos in favour of integrated flash array and application data protection.

“Organisations want game-changers like flash without introducing risk,” said Manish Goel, HPE’s general manager for storage, “to meet those demands, Hewlett Packard Enterprise simplifies flash storage from the entry to enterprise.”

Adobe, Content & Applications, Document Management, DropBox, News & Analysis, Storage, Storage as a Service

Adobe tweaks Document Cloud to unblock Dropbox and make e-signing easier

AdobeAdobe has announced two improvements to document management in the cloud, by making PDF files more manageable in Dropbox and solving one of the snags in electronic document signing.

One billion users of Adobe Acrobat DC and Adobe Acrobat Reader will now be able to edit PDFs as they sit in Dropbox folders, the vendor has announced, as it has worked with Dropbox to simplify the way that PDF files can be edited with Adobe apps.

According to Adobe, the billion mobile devices and desktop computers in the world that have Adobe Acrobat software contain 18 billion PDF files whose functions are limited by Dropbox. The blockage that stopped users from editing those files has now been removed as part of a drive to make Adobe Document Cloud more efficient, the vendor claims.

The improvement was achieved after the two companies integrated their applications and services on mobile devices, desktops and the web, according to Kevin M. Lynch, general manager of Adobe Document Cloud.

Users can now view and edit PDF files stored in their Dropbox Basic, Pro and Dropbox for Business accounts with any changes automatically saved back to Dropbox. Collaboration has also been simplified, Abode claims, as Acrobat DC users can now execute the full range of tasks promised by the application. Editing text on PDF files, organising pages and converting documents to their original format will no longer be hindered by Dropbox environment. Meanwhile, the synchronisation of documents will no longer be restricted by glitches between Adobe and Dropbox operating software.

Adobe has had to adjust as customers have constantly evolved, said Lynch. “Today, mobile has become the rule and people expect to complete work quickly and simply wherever and whenever they need. Our work with Dropbox will help Document Cloud customers be more productive,” said Lynch.

Adobe has also created new options for e-signing in Document Cloud in a bid to make electronic document management easier. New functions include a visual drag-and-drop Workflow Designer, digital signatures (a more advanced secure form of e-signatures) and Enterprise Mobility Management and Signature Capture.

Adobe said it has worked with Workday, Salesforce and Ariba to add e-signing options to their respective HR, sales, procurement and legal systems.

Bryan Lamkin, Adobe digital media’s general manager, promised, “a new level of efficiency”.

Cleversafe, hybrid cloud, IBM, News & Analysis, Storage, Storage as a Service

IBM acquires storage vendor Cleversafe in hybrid cloud play

IBMEnterprise IT giant IBM has announced it will be acquiring object-based storage software and appliances vendor Cleversafe to boost its storage and hybrid cloud offering.

IBM will integrate the Cleversafe portfolio into its IBM Cloud business unit. The growth in the amount of unstructured data companies are looking to process, coupled with the need to find a balance between on-premise and cloud storage deployments, has created the demand for more storage options and greater flexibility, according to IBM.

“Today a massive digital transformation is underway as organizations increasingly turn to cloud computing for innovative ways to manage more complex business operations and increasing volumes of data in a secure and effective way,” said Robert LeBlanc, SVP of IBM Cloud. “Cleversafe, a pioneer in object storage, will add to our efforts to help clients overcome these challenges by extending and strengthening our cloud storage strategy, as well as our portfolio.”

“IBM is an innovator and leader in cloud and storage and we’re excited about the opportunities that lay ahead once this transaction closes,” said John Morris, President and CEO of Cleversafe. “Together with IBM we can extend our object storage leadership position to address the broadest set of workloads for clients with the most expansive set of object-based solutions.”

The terms of the deal haven’t been disclosed, but Cleversafe employs 210 people so the size of the acquisition is likely to be in the tens of million dollars.

Incidentally IBM has also announced a new mobile cloud security solution aimed at enterprise, which is a combination of products from both companies.

“More employees are using mobile devices to be more productive. At the same time, data and apps are moving to the cloud. The changes are exciting, but security needs to be top-of-mind,” said Steve McGaw, CMO of AT&T Business Solutions. “Trusted collaborators like IBM are helping us better address changing business models. Together we’re giving options to deliver highly secure mobile access to cloud apps and data.”

Azure, Cloud Storage, DataStax, Microsoft, News & Analysis, Storage as a Service

DataStax Enterprise delivered with Microsoft Azure to run on any cloud

AzureOpen source distributed database developer Datastax has worked with partner Microsoft to fine tune the delivery of its new cloud based system over the latter’s Azure service.

The new service, DataStax Enterprise (DSE) running on Microsoft’s Azure cloud service, was unveiled at the Cassandra Summit in California.

Databases no longer have to be centralised to have integrity according to Microsoft and Datastax, who claim to have created a distributed database that runs smoothly across all the varieties of the cloud. Datastax claims its DSE makes it easy to move Apache Cassandra and DSE workloads between data centres, service providers and Azure. DataStax claims customers can now build hybrid applications that can make full use of all three resources.

The new system aims to bring a stable version of a database to the cloud, overcoming the challenge of maintain one version of each record when elements of the database are stored on different computers at different locations. Datastax claims it can overcome the technical difficulties involved in both integrity and scalability so that users can enjoy the advantage of cloud computing, like flexibility of scale and cost controls, without surrendering the traditional strengths of a monolithic system.

The fine-tuning of the DSE with Azure ensures that the enterprises can have a development and production-ready ‘bring your own license’ clusters, claimed DataStax CEO Billy Bosworth. These can be launched in minutes on the Azure Marketplace platform using Azure resource management (ARM) templates, he told delegates at the summit.

Increasingly DataStax Enterprise customers use the database in hybrid cloud environments. Its alignment with Microsoft helps any company needing to build high-performance IoT, mobile and web apps quickly, said Bosworth.

“DataStax is a natural partner as it can build systems that scale across thousands of servers, which is ideal for a hyper-scale cloud environment,” said Scott Guthrie, Microsoft VP for Cloud and Enterprise.

BackBlaze, News & Analysis, Public Cloud, Storage, Storage as a Service

Backblaze launches cheap cloud storage service

BackBlaze B2 screenBackup service provider Backblaze has made a cloud storage service available for beta testing. When launched it could provide businesses with a cheap alternative to the Amazon S3 and the storage services bundled with Microsoft Azure and Google’s Cloud.

According to sources, Backblaze B2 will offer a free tier of service of up to 10GB storage, with 1GB/ per day of outbound traffic and unlimited inbound bandwidth. Developers will be able to access it through an API and command-line interface, but the service will also offer a web interface for less technical users.

Launched in 2007 Backblaze stores 150 petabytes of backup data and over 10 billion files on its servers, having built its own storage pods and software as a policy. Now, it intends to use this infrastructure building knowledge to offer a competitive cloud storage service, according to CEO Gleb Budman.

“We spent 90 per cent of our time and energy on building out the cloud storage and only 10 per cent on the front end,” Glebman told Tech Crunch. The stability of its backup service technology persuaded many users to extend the service into data storage. In response to customer demand,

Backblaze’s engineers spent a year working on the software to make this possible. Now the company is preparing to launch a business to business service that, it says, can compete with the cloud storage market’s incumbents on price and availability.

Backblaze’s service, when launched, will be half the price of Amazon Glacier, and ‘about a fourth’ of Amazon’s S3 service, according to sources. “Storage is still expensive,” Glebman said.

Though the primary use for Backblaze B2 will be to store images, videos and other documents, Budman said he expects some users to use it to store large research data sets.

Amazon, AWS, News & Analysis, Storage, Storage as a Service

Amazon Web Services to offer new hierarchical storage options after customer feedback

amazon awsAmazon Web services (AWS) is adding a new storage class to speed up the retrieval of frequently accessed information.

The announcement was made by AWS chief evangelist Jeff Barr on his company blog. Customer feedback had made AWS conduct an analysis of usage patterns, Barr said. AWS’s analytical team discovered that many customers store rarely-read backup and log files, which compete for resources with shared documents or raw data that need immediate analysis. Most users have frequent activity with their files shortly after uploading them after which activity drops off significantly with age. Information that’s important but not immediately urgent needs to be addressed through a new storage model, said Barr.

In response AWS has unveiled a new S3 Standard, within which there is a hierarchy of pricing options, based on the frequency of access. Customers now have the choice of three S3 storage classes, Standard, Standard – IA (infrequent access) and Glacier. All still offer the same level of 99.999999999 per cent durability.‎ The IA Standard for infrequent access has a service level agreement (SLA) of 99 per cent availability and is priced accordingly. Prices start at $0.0125 per gigabyte per month with a 30 day minimum storage duration for billing and a $0.01 per gigabyte charge for retrieval. The usual data transfer and request charges apply.

For billing purposes, objects that are smaller than 128 kilobytes are charged for 128 kilobytes of storage. AWS says this new pricing model will make its storage class more economical for long-term storage, backups and disaster recovery.

AWS has also introduced a lifecycle policy option, in a system that emulates the hierarchical storage model of centralised computing. Users can now create policies that will automate the movement of data between Amazon S3 storage classes over time. Typically, according to Barr, uploaded data using the Standard storage class will be moved by customers to Standard IA class when it’s 30 days old, and on to the Amazon Glacier class after another 60 days, where data storage will $0.01 per gigabyte per month.