Datera Bolsters Software-Defined Data Services Platform

Datera, the software-defined storage vendor, has released the latest version (3.3) of its Datera Data Services Platform for private clouds in the enterprise, with a host of new features and improvements that include faster performance and enhanced data-efficiency capabilities.

The updated release features a 25-50% increase in IOPS per data node through improved utilization of the underlying NVMe, Flash and hybrid storage media, the company said. In addition, enhanced data compression and deduplication capabilities, along with the platform’s ability to monitor and fine-tune those functions, aims to provide improved performance without degradation or human intervention.

The Datera Data Services Platform is also now available with a wider range of HPE ProLiant DL servers, as well as in a broader range of bundles that bring together Datera software, HPE ProLiant servers and StoreFabric M-Series switches from Mellanox Technologies that make it easier for businesses to move to a software-defined infrastructure.

Hal Woods, Datera’s CTO, told Channel Futures that the expanded features in the platform will help partners and their customers improve their IT infrastructures.

Datera’s Hal Woods

“Deduplication, added to compression, encryption, replication and data protection improves efficiency, further extending Datera’s data management capabilities,” said Woods. “Greater options in data placement enable even more flexibility to dynamically balance latency, throughput, cost and protection of data over its life cycle.”

In addition, the performance improvements insure maximum utilization of physical resources as well as ensuring that customers can benefit from new generations of media such as NVMe and persistent memory, said Woods. Datera conducts most of its business through the channel.

“The channel benefits by being able to offer greater options and expertise in helping customers extract value from their data, insuring the channel is efficient and effective in acting as the trusted adviser for customers,” he said.

“The channel is always looking for two things: high-average selling price deals and margin,” said Woods. “Despite the rumors of the public cloud blotting out the sun, there will be $160 billion worth of infrastructure sales for on-premises data centers this year.”

Meanwhile, storage remains a huge piece of that puzzle in a very competitive market, said Woods.

“So resellers are forced to compete to win. Because Datera brings a software-centric offering to market, it drives margin into deals with large commodity hardware installs, meaning it can really pay off for the reseller. Lastly, this approach to infrastructure enables resellers to build a competency and get ahead of their competition, rather than just be another box-pusher.”

Dan Olds, an analyst with Gabriel Consulting Group, said this new version of the Datera platform is a solid advance on its existing offering, giving customers an always welcome increase in performance, with up to 50% more IOP/s per node.

Gabriel Consulting’s Dan Olds

“The channel and end-user customers are always looking for the most efficient components they can find,” said Olds. “When it comes to a storage platform, Datera has a lot to offer. It gives users a high-performance, cloud-like usage model, orchestrating customer data so it is always on the right storage tier at the right time. Datera is also platform-agnostic, meaning that the underlying hardware can be from any vendor and still work with Datera’s software.”

The company’s integration with HPE’s composable infrastructure will definitely help Datera …

… gain market share with existing HPE customers, added Olds.

Pund-IT’s Charles King

“The fact that they are compatible with Mellanox’s storage fabric switches is also a big positive for the company.”

Another analyst, Charles King of Pund-IT, said since Datera focuses on storage services for Tier 1 and mission-critical apps, the new offerings will largely be of interest to channel players that work with enterprise customers or companies with intensive storage requirements.

“Within that framework, there could be ample opportunities for channel companies,” said King. “There’s been steady growth in demand for cloud-based storage services that support demanding processes, such as backup and recovery. That’s mainly due to companies coming to realize that cloud services offer most of the benefits and far fewer headaches than managing and maintaining dedicated, remote data centers for backup and disaster recovery.”