AOS: The next big thing in data storage

Globalization has brought newer business challenges in the enterprise. Issues like better corporate governance and compliance (be it Sarbanes-Oxley in the US that requires timely and accurate financial reporting, or Clause 49 in India) have taken the center stage. Enterprises are coming under increased pressure to reduce operational risks; increase business efficiency and create more business value.   

In a complicated business scenario, IT is required to get a real time and integrated view of enterprise information; unlock information separated by transactional and interoperability silos and get accurate, timely information for compliance and operational efficiency. Enterprises increasingly look to consolidate the IT infrastructure (workstations, servers, data storage, data centers and networks) to reduce costs and simplify operations.

Reduction in ROI through improved management, resource optimization and process automation; business continuity and adoption of IT standards are some of the key concerns for CIOs. While business needs may vary from a SOHO to an enterprise, companies of all sizes are deploying a growing variety of applications to meet evolving business needs.   

Applications have become one of the most critical drivers of business processes and decision-making, impacting organizational growth, risk and profitability. However, every application has unique performance, access, protection and retention requirements and places unique demands on the IT environment in terms of cost, capacity, performance, and level of availability. Therefore, it is imperative that businesses optimize their data storage infrastructure and management to address application requirements.   

There is a logical thread between top-line business issues and data storage. Application optimized storage (AOS) is a strategy that aligns business and IT by optimizing data storage infrastructure and management with application requirements based upon price, performance, availability and functionality. It can help companies achieve top performance, high quality of service (QoS), cost-efficient storage deployment, regulatory compliance, reduced downtime and quick recovery.

The AOS concept is based on a utility model that allows you to charge business units and applications for specific usage and not at a flat rate. The concept of centralization can be made practically possible with a large number of users utilizing a common pool of data storage resources, economically. Integrated metering tools in AOS helps monitor the utilization of the available resources and keep a track of the under-utilized and over-utilized resources. The under-utilized resource can then be used to share the load of the over-utilized resource. Allocation of hardware, capacity and bandwidth takes place on an On-Demand basis that facilitates optimum consumption of the available resources.   

A typical IT environment in the enterprise collects, stores and analyzes incremental volumes of information about products, customers and transactions. There is a growing reliance on e-mail, e-commerce systems, and websites to communicate and conduct business. Digitizing of records, images and other types of fixed content is happening increasingly to boost efficiency and comply with evolving government regulations.

An IDC survey conducted in the US among 270 IT executives in 2005 revealed that transactional applications such as ERP, CRM, and OLTP were the single-largest consumer of capacity (accounting for 32.1 per cent of capacity, on average). File and print servers accounted for just 2.8 per cent of the capacity, slightly less than that dedicated to supporting websites. Both of the application types were far exceeded in terms of capacity used by newer applications like e-mail and digital content. E-mail consumed 7.7 per cent of capacity, and digital content consumed 10.8 per cent of capacity.  

Accommodating a variety of information types, while boosting business continuity goals, poses a significant challenge for budget-conscious IT executives. Between 2005 and 2008, IDC forecasts that the total enterprise data storage capacity globally deployed annually will increase 367 per cent, from 1,786 PB to 6,652 PB. Deploying data storage optimized to meet the unique requirements of diverse applications is more than a theoretical concept.

Today, enterprises can build data storage environments that enable application-optimized data storage. The key components of these solutions include a network-based data storage controller architecture that allows data storage managers to virtualize and create large, dynamic data storage pools as well as finely tune the performance of key data storage components (e.g., cache, network ports, volumes) optimized for specific applications: A range of data storage systems that can be deployed with networked data storage controllers to support tiers of data storage to best meet application performance, capacity growth, availability levels and cost requirements; an integrated suite of data storage management software that automates the provisioning of capacity, the movement of data between tiers of heterogonous data storage and the reliable protection of data for rapid application recovery and a comprehensive portfolio of consulting and deployment services to ensure that organizations achieve timely and maximal returns on their data storage investments.  

The tangible benefits of AOS were seen in the case of University of Utah Health Sciences Center. With over 200 per cent annual data storage growth rate and increased data storage access requirements, there was a need to simplify infrastructure and management, increase utilization, and enhance data replication and backup. AOS helped the Center reap 127 per cent ROI over 14 months; reduced the number of employees required to manage the infrastructure and improved overall system performance by nearly 100 per cent. Deployment of tiered data storage, which is a critical component of AOS reduced ongoing cost of ownership and extended the useful life of existing data storage resources. AOS is recommended for every growing enterprise across verticals, whether BFSI or telecom or healthcare, reeling under information explosion and has the most demanding data storage requirements.  

Finally, AOS can reap the desired results only if IT departments implement effective data storage consolidation; successfully migrate data to new systems and change existing administrative policies and procedures. Effective implementation is especially critical when implementing solutions designed to boost the performance and reliability of enterprise applications. The choice of the right data storage supplier would assist CIOs prioritize applications, upgrade systems, provision new resources and institute consistent replication and application recovery policies to get the maximum mileage from AOS deployment.  

(The author is director, Software Solutions, APAC, Hitachi Data Systems)

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