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Hitachi Vantara, born last September as a wholly owned subsidiary of the global Hitachi Ltd., is starting to assert its own storage-business personality.
This is way more than just an organizational update. Hitachi Vantara is a essentially a new company resulting from the convergence of Hitachi Data Systems, Hitachi Insight Group and Pentaho. The new entity combines Hitachi’s 107-year experience in operational technology with 59 years of IT expertise, providing data management for business insight.
Newswise, HV this week launched updates to its data-infrastructure portfolio, which include a new lineup of all-flash and hybrid flash/HDD systems and integrated artificial intelligence-powered analytics and IT automation software.
Agile Data Infrastructure a Key Descriptor
Data center modernization, also known by the hype term “digital transformation,” usually begins with a fresh set of agile servers and storage hardware that can move data workloads at high speed and low latency with plenty of support for diverse requirements and multicloud integration. HV is putting its bid in for that new business.
The company’s new all-flash VSP F series and hybrid-flash VSP G series systems offer an agile data infrastructure with up to three times more IOPS performance and 2.5x greater scalability than previous versions. Improved cloud and container integration allow more workloads to run on a single system while helping to eliminate data silos and supporting new workloads, HV said.
The new enterprise-class Hitachi VSP models include the all-flash VSP F700 and VSP F900 and the hybrid flash VSP G700 and G900 systems. To reach a broader range of customers, Hitachi is introducing new midrange models: the VSP F350, F370, G350 and G370 systems. These systems are powered by the next generation of Hitachi Storage Virtualization Operating System, SVOS RF, which has been re-architected for increased performance, scalability and data efficiency.
All new VSP systems are backed by Hitachi’s new flat-charge service model and come with a foundation software package that includes Hitachi’s infrastructure analytics and copy data manangement software. All new Hitachi VSP systems are available now.
What’s New Under the Hood
The new improvements include:
- scaling to more than 2.4M IOPS and 41GB/s of bandwidth;
- up to 70 percent more IOPS per core for increased price/performance;
- up to 3.4x faster depublication and 5x faster deduplication and 5x faster SVOS RF-based compression.
- 8x more volumes and 1 million snapshots to support greater workload consolidation, as in large VMware VVOL environments; and
Intelligence Added to Operations
Hitachi Vantara has integrated and enhanced its AI operations software portfolio, which includes Hitachi Infrastructure Analytics Advisor (HIAA), Hitachi Automation Director (HAD) and Hitachi Data Instance Director (HDID).
Hitachi Infrastructure Analytics Advisor features an AI-powered engine to provide deeper data center insights by looking across the data path that includes virtual machines, servers, networks and storage. HIAA uses machine learning to more efficiently optimize, troubleshoot and predict data center needs, HV said.
New HIAA capabilities, according to HV, include:
- Predictive analytics: AI mines telemetry data to predict when new storage purchases will be required, improving budget planning and helping to prevent performance dips. Machine learning analyzes all resources associated with storage to help ensure the right resource is purchased.
- Four-times faster root cause analysis: Patented AI engine analyzes telemetry data and configuration changes across the data path to isolate issues and uses a new heuristic engine to recommend resolution. Integration with Hitachi Automation Director allows immediate fixes based on best practices.
Hitachi Automation Director software provides an engine for orchestrating the delivery and management of IT resources so teams can focus on innovation.
HAD has been improved to:
- integrate with IT service management (ITSM) tools, including the ServiceNow platform, for improved tracking and control of IT resource delivery;
- improve REST API integration for provisioning of third-party resources, including storage;
- take commands from HIAA for issue remediation and storage configuration data; and
- automate the setup of HDID data protection to safeguard against data loss or downtime.
The new integrations between HIAA, HAD and HDID are part of Hitachi’s growing AI operations initiative to help customers begin the journey to autonomous operations. These offerings are now available independently, or packaged together with Hitachi VSP to help customers get the tools they need for data center modernization.
HV also offers the industry’s only storage line with an available 100 percent data availability guarantee. For more information, go here.