Solutions built with Albireo and delivered by leading hardware, software and service providers are on the way. From SOHO/SMB appliances, to flash-based, high performance enterprise storage and cloud, Permabit Albireo software massively improves performance and efficiency of data creation, transmission and storage.

Explore the examples of Albireo deployments on our site, see how you can license our optimization products and let us know how we can help you to optimize your company’s products.

“Accelerate the deployment of storage efficiency improving technologies and procedures.”

Data growth isn’t going away. IDC says it will grow to over 3.5ZB in 2012, doubling the volume of 2011, and by 2020  35ZB will be created annually. I’ve always believed change (and even crisis) creates opportunity.  In this case, the flood-gates are open for highly efficient (dedupe enabled) flash storage to make major market share gains.  Disruptive flash storage with unprecedented performance, reliability and efficiency will erupt on the scene in 2012.

Just in case you need to reference HP’s initial StoreOnce announcement in June 2009 (a landmark case of vaporware):  http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/newsroom/press_kits/2010/techforum2010/pdf/TF_Storage_DedupAdvisory.pdf

Our implementation of Dedupe 2.0 is Permabit Albireo and was launched June 2010. Since then, Albireo has been widely tested by our OEM partners and prospects as well as industry analyst labs such as ESG. Our latest ESG Lab validated benchmarks confirm our throughput of 1.44 PB/hr vs. HP’s 28 TB/hr.  Albireo can scale to over 20PB capacity and HP is well under a PB. Not really much of a comparison! HP’s reality is still obviously backup only.

Our approach is much broader and much more pervasive in the application of deduplication. Albireo was built for all storage deduplication from the data center to cloud deployments. Our flexible deployment capabilities enable our OEM vendors to leverage our SDK up and down the data stack from the OS through applications, databases and across all storage tiers (primary, secondary, backup, archive and cloud). In response to customer demand, we announced Albireo VDO which enables OEM vendors to implement Albireo as a turn-key Linux solution.  Permabit is delivering on the vision that HP repeatedly announces anytime they mention StoreOnce but have only delivered backup dedupe.

Anytime HP would like to “bake-off” their StoreOnce offering vs. Permabit Albireo we would be more than happy to engage!  Oh, and HP let us know if you are interested in purchasing the dedupe2.com domain.  Since we have delivered on our Dedupe 2 vision, the dedupe2.com content now resides on www.permabit.com along with all the product details, performance numbers, and deployment options.

We have two announcements at the show. The first is around Permabit extending our VMware Alliance to the Select level.  That means we are partnering more closely with VMware and their ecosystem. We are the only OEM data optimization partner of VMware.  Our second announcement is of our new OEM relationship with BlueArc. Interestingly, the VMworld theme of every storage vendor, save two, is about ‘interoperability’. While good, interoperability or integrating with the VM management console isn’t that exciting to me. The real value is in optimizing the storage of VM. That brings me back to my main point – only two storage companies are talking about optimizing VMware environments – NetApp and our new OEM partner BlueArc and that sets them apart from the rest of the storage crowd.

A couple of weeks ago the subject of how important data optimization is to NetApp’s growth came up during a discussion with a prominent analyst. He attributed NetApp’s growth to two factors: adopting primary data optimization and hitching their wagon to VMware. In effect he said, by implementing a dedupe solution and becoming the preferred storage for a software vendor exhibiting 40% growth (VMware), NetApp was achieving fantastic growth.

That made me think, why isn’t NetApp being as highly valued as 3PAR by the market? I mean they are growing faster and have a more complete product offering.  So, why aren’t they getting as high a multiple? Hmm…could it be because the market doesn’t believe NetApp’s VMware driven growth will continue, that it is vulnerable and will come under strong competition? I can confirm VMDK/VDI optimization is a strong driver for our OEM customers, so I do see optimization rather than interoperability becoming table stakes at the VMware game.

We welcome BlueArc as a new OEM partner. Their high performance NAS offering will soon be even higher value and a perfect solution for VMware environments. My prediction is BlueArc and their partners will nick away at NetApp’s market leadership by offering the highest performing primary dedupe solution, Albireo and gain share in the high growth VMware market. Good luck to Gus and the BlueArc team.

And, yesterday, IBM announced the acquisition of Storwize. This is another great proof point for primary data optimization going main stream. Here’s how we view these developments:

• Primary data optimization is emerging and will gain momentum over the coming months as storage companies seek to protect margins and improve their competitive positions.
• Optimization technologies that are out of the data path and preserve data safety and storage performance will win in the market.

From our perspective, it’s still early in the game. Both Storwize and Ocarina sold data path appliances – and that is a very challenging (some would say, impossible) business model. Both are better as “owned” assets. Here is our take on the deals.

Dell/Ocarina

We are hearing from many who are questioning this transaction.

• Ocarina’s attempt to move from vertical (Media/Entertainment & Oil & Gas) to horizontal enterprise application will be a significant challenge. Moving from secondary and application niches to primary and enterprise – is like going from Summer League to the Big Show (baseball metaphor).
• Ocarina signed some nice names for “meet in the market” appliance deals, but received limited to no traction since their signing.
• Dell acquired an appliance technology (and maybe some beta code)? Is this a technology fit for Dell?
  • Dell has a limited storage portfolio today – they only own two SKUs of any significance (Windows Storage Server and EqualLogic).
  • Ocarina is a doubtful bolt on to CLARiiON which is in the middle of the Dell storage portfolio! How does Dell go end to end? Big stretch.
  • In this case end-to-end data optimization is at best point-to-point if the Ocarina embedded technology is valid!
  • EqualLogic begs the question of “what is the technology value of Ocarina content aware compression in block environments?”
  • Dell has had limited integration track record. Will Ocarina be different?
• Dell has some heavy lifting to do. End to end in anything is hard work and not for the faint of heart. It takes a full product portfolio and a robust technology solution to make it happen.

IBM/Storwize

From our perspective, IBM’s acquisition of Storwize makes sense.

• Compression is a great first step toward data optimization for IBM.
• If combined with a unified deduplication capability, IBM could have a best of breed data optimization solution giving IBM a lead on its competitors.
• Storwize compression today is an “in the data path” operation. From our perspective, that reason alone makes sense for IBM to own it – lock, stock and barrel – so it can be embedded into their storage architectures to minimize its impact.
• From our take, IBM hits a double (another baseball metaphor) and the heat will continue to quickly rise around the value of data optimization. How they move this forward to potentially score the winning run (yet another…) to compete with HP, EMC, HDS and now Dell, will play out over the coming months.

Permabit

There’s been much speculation around who Permabit is working with and what happens next.  We began introducing OEMs to Albireo primary data optimization about 9 months ago. We’ll confirm, we are working to enable dozens of storage products with deduplication that will enter the market in 2010-2012 and leave the speculation to Dave Raffo at SearchStorage and others as to who our partners are.  Again, it is early, but we are on a mission to provide Albireo data optimization to storage vendors to leverage their R&D and market reach and make their storage better, faster and more efficient.

We firmly believe for any company to make it past the early innings (final baseball metaphor) with an OEM data optimization solution, they need to offer the following:

• Solid, tested architecture – seasoned
• No performance impact – capable of handling demanding primary workloads
• No data safety compromise – out of read path
• Scale – to PBs of data capacity
• Best of class dedupe rates – for massive storage savings

Albireo offers all of that and the fastest route to market for storage companies looking to add data optimization to their products. For those of you keeping score, what do you think?