KUALA LUMPUR, 29 APRIL 2009 — Customers can get more efficiency in their storage management, according to Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) Malaysia, which has announced its ‘switch it on’ programme, offering free storage virtualisation software.
HDS Malaysia managing director Johnson Khoo said that the programme enabled customers to consolidate all externally attached, third-party storage under common management. “This also allows optimisation through advanced capabilities, such as transparent data movement, dynamic provisioning, intelligent tiering and disaster recovery.”
Khoo said the free package constitutes a fully-paid software licence and does not include required software maintenance. “This initiative reaffirms our commitment to help customers save money by enabling them to leverage existing assets they own and reclaim under-utilised storage capacity.”
“Customers tell us we have the winning strategy because ours is built on enabling customers to do more with less and improving on operational and capital expenditures,” he said. “By leveraging our market leading storage virtualisation technology, customers can dynamically thin provision not only internal storage, but external storage as well for non-disruptive data movement, copies, replication, business continuity and migration of thin volumes across externally virtualised storage.”
Analyst firm IDC vice president, enterprise storage systems, Benjamin S. Woo, said: “Customers are increasingly aware that their data should be considered as digital assets. By consolidating and increasing utilisation through virtualisation technologies, customers can maximise the return on their digital assets as well as the return on the investment in the infrastructure that protects those assets."
