Storage Comes of Age

Industry major HP has rolled out an ambitious storage strategy with the aim

of capturing the immense potential that lies in emerging markets like India. The

company’s strategy comes close on the heels of an Aberdeen Group study, which

states that the worldwide storage management market will grow at a compound

annual growth rate of 27% and will reach $21 billion by 2005. The report is a

clear pointer that storage-related investments would consume much of enterprise

IT spending in coming times. Not surprisingly, storage vendors like HP are

gunning for a major marketshare in this segment.

A storage federation



Storage, despite being a critical factor, has never found its rightful

place in the MIS policy of companies so far. This is mainly due to lack of

awareness about storage options and the fact that it is not considered a

mission-critical element. In fact, it is often a crisis that leads to

a storage policy. However, there’s a growing consensus now among CIOs about

the need for a proactive storage policy, and many consider it as a key

component of the organization’s IT infrastructure. But evolving a storage

policy is not an easy task–it involves taking stock of the companies’ entire

IT hardware and software infrastructure, and issues like the consolidation of

disparate systems into one storage repository can be quite daunting. Here’s

where HP’s Federated Storage Area Management (FSAM) strategy comes in.

The FSAM Advantage

Easy integration of disparate systems Flexible, yet robust storage architecture Ten times more storage output Better disaster recovery through mirroring techniques Optimal use of storage resources

Explains Subroto Das, marketing manager, Network Storage Solutions Operations

(NSSO), HP Asia Pacific, "The federated storage area management strategy

consists of three components — storage management, storage virtualization and

storage capacity. If these three aspects are managed properly, it increases

storage efficiency by 10 times," adds Das.

The very aim of the FSAM strategy is to bring in consolidation and continuity

in the storage demands of the enterprise. The key feature of the strategy lies

in the scale-out architecture, which enables easy scaling up and down of storage

capacities as per the requirement, without disrupting operations. Scaling is

considered as a major challenge before modern day storage, the success factor

here depends on creating a flexible yet robust architecture that facilitates

easy scaling. The FSAM agenda then is to integrate a network of modular

appliances through storage software, subsystems, and services. Here, the key

binding factor is the storage virtualization aspect, which enables storage to be

managed as a single logical entity even when the storage capacities are

physically distributed across various geographies. This ideal storage network is

termed as the federation of storage resources.

According to an analyst at Aberdeen Group, " Federated storage assumes

significance for HP, because it scales beyond a storage area network. FSAM

builds toward an infrastructure that includes an efficiently administrated group

of appliances and subsystems that is integrated with the storage management

services. This creates a scalable environment of multi-platform storage

resources."

Strategic moves



To become a one-stop storage vendor through FSAM, HP has made some strategic

moves. The company has acquired Storage Apps, a storage virtualization company,

and teamed forces with Adaptec for iSCSI (IP Small Computer Systems Interface)

Ethernet storage area network (SAN) connectivity. With an ambitious strategy

under its sleeve, HP is consolidating its channel partner network across India,

with a renewed focus on storage solutions. The company has identified software

houses, SMB’s (small and medium-sized businesses), financial institutions and

defense establishments as major storage buyers.

The FSAM strategy has given HP a major fillip. Observes Avijit Basu,

marketing manager, NSSO, HP India, "With FSAM in place, we are firmly

positioned to deliver storage products, solutions and services that will enable

enterprises to achieve a stress free storage environment."

G Shrikanth in Chennai