Wake up, SMEs!

We started out doing this story to explain how mid-sized growing

organizations can benefit by moving away from the traditional direct-attached

storage (DAS) model to more sophisticated network storage architecture like

network-attached storage (NAS) and storage area network (SAN). But speaking to

vendors and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across the industry, what

emerged is that most of the mid-sized companies do not use networked storage

solutions. In fact, they believe that they do not need them!

Does it mean that SMEs really don’t need better technology to manage their

storage needs or does it mean they are actually not aware of the importance of

managing IT better? While some enterprises see the high cost of NAS and SAN as a

problem, the strongest deterrent is the belief that existing storage systems are

adequate. This prompted us to define the term ‘enterprise storage solution’.

It also forced us to probe into the sudden extraordinary growth in the volume of

data and the implications of not having a scalable storage infrastructure.

When disaster strikes...

Without a sound storage system in place, a calamity could cripple business for days to come Revenue:  Lost revenue due to application outages, reduced market capitalization, lost billing records, marketing programs rendered useless Business Interruption:  End-users stop work, IT operations disrupted, customers cannot access data, suppliers cannot complete service, incoming phone calls increase, orders are lost and customer care calls disconnected Competitiveness:  Weapon used by competition, lost business, lost market share, higher expenses Litigation:  Investor filings, supplier misunderstandings, unmet customer contracts Reputation: Customer perception, investor and lender uncertainty, hiring slow down, employee turnover

What to look for when choosing a storage solution...

Heterogeneous server and operating systems connectivity Scalability Data availability and integrity Consolidation and movement of data without downtime No downtime for business-critical applications Online backup from storage — server and network less backup Enterprise-wide business continuity and disaster recovery Information sharing between different servers and operating systems NAS and SAN support in the same storage for flexibility of future technology Common management for storage infrastructure Installed base of storage systems using selected servers and applications Â

Data is money, honey!

‘‘Corporate data is the lifeblood of any organization,

and is often shared not only across different functions, but geographies and

different time zones as well,’’ says Vincent Chew, market manager, Asiapac

region, Adaptec Manufacturing. And this data is growing at the rate of 80

percent per year. According to IDC estimates, new data storage would grow from

184,641 terabytes of stored data worldwide in 1999 to 2,000,000 terabytes in

2003.

While experts agree that the Internet has really been the

driving factor for this avalanche of data, the verticals have discovered that

detailed data can pump up sales, manage costs, control risks and increase

customer satisfaction as well.

For instance, in a big retail outlet, the increase in sale

depends on having the right products available in right quantities at right

locations at the right time. Web-based businesses are involved in the

competitive use of detailed data to the ultimate degree. They can learn more

about their customers’ shopping habits than anyone else because they have the

opportunity to analyze every keystroke and mouse click. This also enables them

to personalize offerings. This can be achieved only by storing the information

garnered during the customer’s prior visits and managing them in such a way

that it’s available, almost anytime.

While detailed or structured data, including information from

the point-of-sale, is just one component of today’s enterprise data explosion,

the world is full of information that is not neatly structured. It may be in

many forms–from text, photographs, x-rays and other images to sound, moving

pictures and speech. What’s more, technology has ensured that each of these

bits of information can be digitized and stored as unstructured data.

So how are the Indian SMEs managing these data today? DAS has

so far been the most popular means of storage, not only for SMEs but also for

many of the large enterprises. Interestingly, however, almost all storage

vendors we spoke to, had more to talk about NAS and SAN than about DAS, which

according to Forrester Research’s May 2001 report has a deployment base of 92

percent.

What is DAS?

Direct attach storage is predominantly a server-centric

storage architecture. The storage device is directly attached to a front-end

server via a small computer system interface (SCSI) or some other standard

interface like fibre channel (FC). Thus, each server has its own storage system

and data from that server is accessed over the network. The servers also manage

the LAN and applications being used. Adding capacity to such a topology means

that administrators either add additional disk space to existing servers, or

bring in new servers. Backup is on a local tape drive or a shared drive over the

network. ‘‘This type of storage solution is relatively low cost and simple

to configure. The drawbacks, however, are that it is not a high availability

solution and there is no storage consolidation,’’ cautions Owais Khan,

Business manager, Enterprise storage, Compaq India.

 

With business requirements demanding increasing storage

space, the shortcomings of managing discrete islands of storage directly

attached to servers have become more pronounced. While small enterprises may

have still not noticed it, larger organizations have already realized the perils

of DAS in the new e-economy. Says P K Gupta, director of engineering, Legato

Systems India, ‘‘Manual tape management, remote office backups, platform

dependent backup utilities and managing new emerging storage topologies are some

of the growing pains of IT managers in enterprises using DAS.’’ Canada-based

Evans Research Corporation (ERC), classifies these shortcomings as–labor cost,

capital expenditure, network performance and business issues.

Vincent Chew, marketing manager, APAC, Adaptec Firms using mission-critical apps are the ones that need storage solutions the most,  regardless of size or the segment that they deal in

According to ERC experts, backing up isolated storage devices

is labor intensive and organizations are facing the issue of IT budget

constraints to match the growth of storage requirements. DAS is not readily

scaleable and additional manpower is required to add new capacity. As captive

storage cannot be easily scaled or even reallocated, organizations are forced to

over-buy, leading to under utilization of infrastructure. Shrinking backup

windows also means that backing up over the network interferes with other

network traffic.

There are business issues too. With the growing enterprises

continuously adding storage capacity, the system often becomes more complex,

thereby increasing the chances of failure. And downtime definitely is a big

issue. Backups may not happen regularly, and security may be compromised because

of the management effort required. In addition, when a server goes down, all

storage attached to that server is unavailable, bringing down productivity.

These limitations of the direct-attach model have led to the development of

storage networking. Both storage area networking (SAN) and network attached

storage (NAS) facilitate the sharing of a pool of storage devices, use network

technologies and have the goal of simplified management of storage.

PROBLEM #1: Only large enterprises need storage solutions like NAS and SAN. Why does a mid-size company like mine require them?

No longer are storage solutions prerogatives of large organizations. ‘‘Smaller players are the ones who suffer most in bad times. While large organisations have alternatives, most small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that run lean and mean  set-ups don’t,’’ warns Basu Hurkadli, country manager, IBM India. Some of the biggest limitations that SMEs face are scalability and manageability issues. Several SMEs do not really have specialized storage solutions in place and substitute them with server-based storage, which is quite cumbersome if data has to be managed across several independent servers. This also means that the companies will never be able to make optimum utilization of their storage capacity. Storage networking is actually about making a company’s storage infrastructure and capacity available to multiple departments by putting it onto a network. This enables data and capacity sharing–but both beneficial to the company as a whole. Capacity sharing results in cost savings. Most SMEs currently use decentralised storage solutions-direct attached storage or traditional raid/array storage. These storage applications are dependent on individual devices or networks. Even with the traditional storage raid sub-system, there is a need to define the sub-raid within the sub-system. The configuration is not flexible enough as it is unable to share the storage in the pool. All these require certain level of IT skills and administrator resources to manage them. It also leads to poor utilisation of infrastructure. Experts believe that by centralising storage capacity and putting it on the network, SMEs can assign capacity to departments on a need basis and increase the capacity utilisation rate by 70 to 90 percent.

Sums up Avijit Basu, marketing manager, HP India, ‘‘The

data user needs continuous access to data and responsive performance. This also

means that the need for a highly reliable data protection solution, single point

of control and efficient manageability. Hence, enterprise storage solutions are

meant not just for large enterprises. They are critical for each of those

companies where data is business.’’

It’s not just storage, silly!

According to T Srinivasan, country manager EMC, ‘‘Enterprise

storage is infrastructure that allows organizations to build a foundation upon

which they will exploit information to their own competitive advantage.’’

PROBLEM #2: Yes, my organization needs a storage solution urgently. But where do I make a start?

Before an organization decides on a storage solution, it needs to review the volume generated and its current data storage capacity. The organization then needs to anticipate what storage capacity it will require when mapped against the business growth plan. Next, it should take stock of the IT environment already in place and plan for a storage solution that can work in a heterogeneous environment. Most SMEs typically have a mix of servers running on different operating platforms, middleware and software. Interoperability of storage solutions across heterogeneous server environments is a key factor that the organization needs to consider. Organizations should freeze on disaster management plans. Based on the level of information protection and information availability that the business requires, an organization can opt for any of the four levels of storage. Level One is standard protection, products and services that offer fundamental backup and recovery of files or entire system volumes from tapes. This service-level assumes straightforward availability and uptime requirements as well as the existence of a ‘backup window’. Level Two is the Transparent Data Protection, which offers the same kind of backup and recovery, but in an environment where uptime requirements are more stringent and there is no backup window. SANs might be used in some installations at this level. Level Three, a more sophisticated offering is fault resilience. At this level companies can use server-failover, SANs, and other technologies to maximize 24 x 7 operations. Level Four has continuous operations. It adds remote-site failover to approach ‘five nines’ (99.999 %) availability of all data and application environments.

To realize an organizational vision of enterprise

information, IT departments are rejecting the notion of storage as an isolated

CPU add-on or peripheral and searching for a higher category of storage. Storage

must be a strategic element of IT infrastructure, bridging the gaps between

disparate platforms so information can be leveraged in new powerful ways.

Storage allows companies to manage, protect, provide access to and efficiently

plan the growth of enormous amounts of information previously dispersed on

multiple servers and mainframes.

T Srinivasan, country manager EMC Unlike server-based storage, enterprise storage connects to ‘stores’ and retrieves data from computing platforms, both in mainframe and open environments

Unlike server-based storage, enterprise storage connects to,

stores and retrieves data from all major computing platforms in both mainframe

and open systems environments. It also connects to networks, file servers, web

servers and management interfaces. Based on enterprise connectivity, enterprise

storage allows for the consolidation of data so managers can leverage this

information from throughout the enterprise into central locations.

‘‘Enterprise Storage also enables cascading,’’

Srinivasan says. "Storage can perform multiple tasks such as information

management, data migration, information sharing and information protection. It

is also a reusable, non-obsolete resource, ensuring that information lives on

even when applications are discarded and replaced" he explains.

While Basu sees enterprise storage as means of consolidation

and business continuity, Sharad Srivastava, country manager, Seagate India

explains, ‘‘A reliable storage solution is one that allows the company to

grow and expand regardless of the physical characteristics of individual storage

devices or networks.’’ According to him, storage management embraces

multiple issues and tasks, some of which are intrinsically linked to wider

issues such as network management and security. ‘‘IT professionals are

concerned with managing the individual components of the storage infrastructure

in addition to the software and services associated with data movement and

replication and the broader issues of storage management. These can be separated

into five categories–storage infrastructure, data protection, management

control, provision of data access and data management,’’ he adds.

Defines Sathyan Gopalan, National Manager, Storage solutions,

Computer Associates, ‘‘An enterprise storage solution is one which addresses

the issue of protection and management of data for an entire organization. It is

a combination of hardware and software.’’ NAS and SAN fit the bill.

What are NAS and SAN?

What are NAS and SAN?

NAS refers to LAN-based file serving (NFS/CIFS) or the

ability to have Ethernet network users view a logical drive as local, even

though it is not directly attached to their machines. NAS provides file based

resource sharing and promises economics of scale as several users can share a

single NAS device. This is aimed at improving manageability.

PROBLEM #3: How do I go about determining the storage needs of my enterprise, and decide on the storage capacities or solutions needed?

Storage needs are computed based on data structures deployed in an organization for the applications used. Each application has its data structure, and the estimate of number of records is derived by the organization based on its business needs. With the number of users and the type of transactions applied by the users, an application’s data access and optimization defines the data structures and their sizes. Sizing tools are available from standard data storage and retrieval packages to assist organizations define their current needs. Besides, simulated what-if tools assist in sizing the growth patterns of data. While there is no single calculation to precisely hit the storage requirements in an organization, good approximations and safety factors in calculation are built in by organizations to arrive at a reasonably accurate size for a pre-defined period of time. Storage needs can also be estimated as a sum total of email space for employees, centralized home directories, database size and growth, web activity storage growth etc. However, the kind of storage solution required by an organization can be qualitatively assessed based on certain factors. Savings on Data Redundancy reduction Savings on Data storage maintenance and management cost Optimizing application performance and functionality Incremental Network infrastructure costs Organizational Fault tolerance and disaster recovery requirements Data Security requirements Network infrastructure availability to support the organizational needs Scalability and Expandability required

SAN on the other hand, is a secondary network to a LAN

consisting of multiple servers and multiple storage devices. This would mean

that the enterprise LAN would be free from massive data transfer loads as backup

traffic occurs between storage devices inside the SAN. It also provides

networkability for block level devices. It provides economics of scale by making

centralized storage assets available to multiple servers within the network.

Also, consolidation makes management much simpler as compared to DAS.

Sathyan Gopalan, national manager, storage solutions, Computer Associates An enterprise storage solution addresses the issue of protection and management of data for the entire firm, a combination of hardware and software

SAN uses TCP/IP networks such as FDDI, Ethernet and ATM where

as NAS uses file server protocols such as NFS and CIFS. But vendors are trying

hard to further blur the distinctions between NAS and SAN. Explains Gupta,

‘‘Network storage combines NAS and SAN. In the networked storage

environment, users make ‘file’ or ‘block’ decisions and then decide over

what medium each will run. For example, traditionally files were only delivered

via Ethernet, and blocks were delivered via SCSI or fibre channel interface (FCl).

Not anymore. With iSCSI, these blocks can now be delivered via Ethernet. Files

can also be transported over FCI’’. Adds Basu, ‘‘Concepts like network

storage appliance (NSA) are one click solutions to bring the simplicity of

implementing high-end storage in the SME segment. A re-configured, pre-tested

standardized set of products and certain default rules can deliver

ready-to-implement, cost effective SAN solutions like the ‘SAN in a Rack’

concept from HP.’’

While NAS is typically thought of as a departmental storage

solution, located in front of servers, filling incremental storage requirements

simply and inexpensively, vendors are offering the ability to cluster groups of

NAS devices on a new, separate IP network, located behind the servers. This

configuration duplicates the advantages of SAN’s separation of storage

traffic. In addition, many NAS devices are being fitted with FC interfaces to

enable connection to SAN storage. This allows the NAS to use storage space in

the SAN for operations or backup.

Do they make business sense?

Where additional storage space is needed close to users, a

NAS is a fast, simple and easy to manage solution. ‘‘A NAS device is

optimized for storage performance and is easier to integrate with existing

technology than a standard server,’’ says S V Ramana, Vice President,

Systems engineering, Cisco Systems. NAS devices are often scalable, to allow

instant addition of capacity to existing devices. With its built-in

intelligence, a NAS can also be connected to an existing direct attach storage

device to provide server-free backup. Management of numerous NAS devices,

especially if they are from different vendors can, however, prove to be

difficult.

PROBLEM #4: How do I calculate my RoI and TCO?

The price of paying for technology is only as good as the returns it gives the organization. At EMC, return on storage investment (ROI) is termed as ‘Return on Information’. The new ROI is about protecting investment in the information that the company has accumulated and ensuring its availability at all times. Increased efficiency, better use of manpower, and increased cost-effectiveness are the immediate potential benefits of storage consolidation. The ROI of a storage solution is also about the cost of business and downtime triggered off by lack of availability of data. According to P K Gupta, director of engineering, Legato Systems India, the cost of downtime per outage (2-3 hours on average) is between $250K to $500K. As for the total cost of ownership (TCO), besides the cost of hardware and software, it also involves the cost of managing and maintaining the system. This also include manpower cost of the IT staff. Other factors of TCO are in terms of improved application availability, improved staff efficiency and scaleable performance. While calculating TCO, one not only needs to consider the initial MB prices, but also the software charges, ongoing software maintenance charges and cost of future upgrades. While there is no sure shot formula to calculate ROI and TCO, IBM’s country manager, Basu Hurkadli offers some simple rules for storage budgeting. First, add up the company’s present storage capacity. Add 10% for rounding errors and then add 50% to 100% depending on the company’s growth plan over the next 12 months. Include any additional requirements in terms of management capabilities desired, archiving, back-up and restore policies. Take this set of requirements and ask storage vendors and service providers for a quotation. Experts, however, suggest that price alone should not determine the buying decision. Look for solutions based on open standards to avoid getting tied to a particular vendor. Don’t forget to ask for independent benchmarks for assessing performance and service levels.

SAN management software can provide a centralized view of

storage. This single view makes management much more efficient. ‘‘With a

storage management tool offered by SAN, a single administrator can manage a

greater amount of storage than a DAS configuration. As storage needs grow, the

increased span of control will translate into savings, ’’explains Basu

Hurkadli, Country Manager, System sales, IBM India.

Avijit Basu, marketing manager, network storage solutions, HP SAN and NAS are set to overtake DAS by 2005. With the volumes of enterprise data doubling every year, even SMEs will be forced to opt for network storage options

SAN management software can also simplify backup in a SAN

environment. This software has the ability to perform backups while the system

is live. No downtime for a dedicated backup window is required. Besides, network

performance is not compromised as the backup traffic flows across the SAN alone.

Server-free backups are also possible in a SAN configuration, where the server

initiates the backup command and then storage devices handle the backup. The 10

km distance limit on SANs allows off-site mirroring and disaster recovery

without compromising performance. In fact, two-thirds of SAN installations can

be justified on the basis of improved backup and recovery alone.

Apart from easier backup, a SAN also improves connectivity.

Says B Chandrashekhar, Head, Storage products, Sun Microsystems, ‘‘With

cross-platform applications, users on different operating systems can share the

same data with specialized software to handle file system issues. When a server

is down, access to storage is not affected. A SAN is scalable and can keep up

with the increasing storage requirements of the enterprise. The centralized view

of storage allows capacity to be re-allocated among applications as required.’’

The benefits of centralizing storage are real, but the costs

for implementing an additional network infrastructure are significant. An FCI

infrastructure must be planned and installed including cabling, switches and

must be able to host bust adapters on servers. Consulting services may be

required to plan and execute the changes. Additional FCI storage devices may

need to be implemented. Third party services may be required to assist in

migrating data to the SAN.

While implementing a NAS or even a small SAN solution can be

an expensive proposition, it is an investment that will cut management costs,

ensure efficient use of storage space and increased availability of data.

SHUBHENDU PARTH In New Delhi

Compaq India

Compaq India

With a total shipment of 385.17 TB during FY 2000, the

company closed its books with storage revenue figures of Rs 216.95 crore

and 37% marketshare rank number one among IDC's list of top five storage

vendors in India. The company offers EMA 12000 and the award winning ESA

12000 products in primary SAN-based storage. In addition, Compaq also

offers the MA8000, RA8000 and MA6000 storage solutions.

Compaq offers SAN works Virtual Replicator, Enterprise

Volume Manager, Data Replication Manager, and Secure Path among other

solutions. These are designed to improve performance of storage area

networks by delivering operational efficiency, business flexibility and

increased manageability. On the NAS front, Compaq has the Task Smart

N-Series server that provides NAS functionality.

• Contact Person: Owais Khan, business manager (enterprise
  
  storage)

• Address: 92, Industrial Suburb II Stage,
  
  Yeshwanthpur, Bangalore 560022

• Tel: 3374785, 3097351,

• E-mail: owais.khan@compaq.com

• URL: http://www.compaq.com/storage

HP India

A strong number two player in the Indian storage

market, the company according to IDC estimates, cornered 22.1% of the

market with total sales worth Rs 134.3 crore. The company offers

end-to-end storage solution, its product ranging from CD writers, storage

media and tape backup to mid and high-end disk arrays. While its Surestore

DAT offers 8-40 GB storage, Surestore DLTs range between 40-80 GB

capacity. In automated backup category it has Surestore Autoloader,

Surestore Autobackup and Surestore tape library. It also offers a fully

integrated, automated backup NAS solution for mobile and desktop PCs with

client disaster recovery facility. On the San front, HP offers one of the

most comprehensive SAN partner programs.

It also ships multi-vendor fibre channel and SAN

storage resource management (SRM) tool. Besides, SAN-based LUN management

and access control solution and business-critical fibre channel solutions

are also part of its portfolio.

• Contact person: Avijit Basu, Marketing
  
  Manager (Network Storage Solutions)

• Address: Chandiwala Estate, Maa Anandmai Marg, Kalkaji, New
  
  Delhi 110019
• Tel: 6826000
• E-mail: avijit_basu@hp.com
• URL: http://www.products.storage.hp.com/eprise/main/storage/Vision/index.htm

IBM India

This number three storage vendor in India, according to

IDC, made total shipment of 109.31 TB worth Rs 89.33 crore during FY 2000.

The company offers a complete range of open disk, tape and storage network

products as well as new NAS, iSCSI, and storage services. Its also has on

offer SAN services and SAN fabric products–switches, hubs and directors.

Its newly announced IBM TotalStorage NAS 200 and 300 appliances are

designed to provide reliable file serving directly over the existing LAN

whereas NAS 300G Gateway links SAN and NAS. The company has enterprise

storage server, modular storage server and FAStT200 RAID storage server

for automated disk storage in consolidated environments, apart from Linear

Tape-Open Ultrium tape libraries. It also offers storage management

software and a wide range of storage services, including operational

support and migration services.

• Contact person: Sandeep Puri, Brand Manager
  
  (Storage Solutions Division)

• Address: 7th Floor Prestige Towers, Residency Road, Bangalore
  
  560025
• Tel: 2079999
• E-mail: psandeep@in.ibm.com
• URL: http://www.sg.ibm.com/storage/in/

Sun Microsystems IDC ranks this company fourth amongst the Top Five storage vendors in the country. Sun Microsystems shipped a total of 92.65 TB and romped home with Rs 78.39 crore revenue from this business. Sun offers an extensive array of storage hardware components that serve as building blocks for creating total solutions–from storage processors, disk arrays, controllers, tape libraries to storage data services and storage management solution

plugins. It also ships storage requirement analysis tools like Sun HighGround SRM that provides a detailed analysis of existing storage deployed and helps organizations work out the

ROI.

Equally important, Sun is the industry leader in the use of fiber channel, the high-performance network medium that is uniquely capable of delivering the network-oriented backbone required for performance, open connectivity, availability, and scalability. Fiber channel is an industry standard, it supports multiple interoperable topologies, and it is ideal for storage, video, graphics, and mass data transfer applications.

• Contact person: B Chandrashekhar, head (storage products)
• Address: 6th Floor, Divyasree Chambers, Off Langford Road,
  
  Shantinagar, Bangalore 560025
• Tel: 2298989, 2072223
• E-mail: bchandra@india.sun.com
• URL: http://www.sun.com/storage

Network Appliance According to IDC, the company’s shipment for FY 2000 was 83.28 TB and worth Rs 38.29

crore. The company pioneered the concept of ‘network appliance’–an extension of the industry trend toward dedicated, specialized products that perform a single function. Its storage and content delivery platforms like filers and NetCache appliances are coupled with powerful content distribution and reporting software. This center-to-edge solution offers seamless data management from the back-end data center to the edge of the network. The Network Appliance product portfolio utilizes the company’s innovative data access software, known as the Data ONTAP operating system, as well as standards-compliant hardware. It also offers multi-protocol support and transparent integration for UNIX and Windows environments. Network Appliance has more than 100 installations of its filers in India. It’s major customers are Texas Instruments,

Rediff, Times Internet and Cadence.

• Contact person: George Thomas, country manager
• Address: 433, 80 Feet Road, Koramangala, Sixth Block, Bangalore 560095,
• Tel: 5522051-54,
• E-mail: gthomas@netapp.com,
• URL: http://www.netapp.com