Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2016. Read them in this 8th Annual VMblog.com series exclusive.
Contributed by Krishna Subramanian, COO of Komprise
The Storage Hero’s Journey
I was listening to an interview where George Lucas described how he modeled Star Wars to emulate the hero’s journey characteristic of mythological epics – with an ordinary hero who is suddenly inspired to embark on an epic journey of transformation aided by new tools not previously available.
I instantly realized that infrastructure/storage IT is embarking on a much similar transformation – leading me to predict that 2016 is going to be the year of the Storage/Data hero.
Here are the key elements of this epic journey:
- The transformation – from storage to data: As data growth continues to explode, while storage budgets remain flat, and as the desire to unlock data value increases, IT is embarking on an epic transformation from managing narrow, contained silos of storage to sprawling estates of data often across multiple storage tiers, clouds and data-centers. In 2016, we will continue to see greater expansion of storage tiers and capabilities -from more performance options including in-memory and flash, to broader capacity options including object, cloud, and better archival solutions. And, we will continue to see new uses of data from a wider array of analytics applications to new dev-ops initiatives. The push and pull of these two forces are driving IT to transform its role to becoming a data steward and broker.
- The hero’s journey – from infrastructure management to data steward: Our hero, the Storage IT manager, will make progress on their journey in 2016 from focusing on managing infrastructure to focusing instead on making data available and accessible when and where it is needed, with the appropriate level of protection and performance it requires, while optimizing its costs. This is a fundamental paradigm shift in the role of IT from being an operator of infrastructure to a service broker whose role is a blend of technology and business, and whose focus is directly aligned with the priorities of the business.
- The tools – new data management software and analytics applications: New data management software is now becoming available that enables IT to automate managing the massive scale of data growth across heterogeneous storage infrastructure and clouds. This enables IT to focus on being a data steward without the headaches and burden of manually managing data sprawl across silos. New analytics applications and frameworks are providing richer ways to use the data to extract meaningful business value.
So, as we ring in the New Year, let us raise a glass to all you data heros – may the Force be with you in 2016!
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About the Author
Krishna Subramanian is COO of Komprise which enables businesses to transform how they manage data. Her prior two data management start-ups are Kaviza which delivered scale-out converged virtual desktop infrastructure used by thousands of customers, OEM’ed by Dell, and acquired by Citrix, and Kovair, a Dropbox-like SaaS solution. Twitter: @cloudKrishna
