More than two-thirds of CEOs of the 2,000 largest global
organizations have identified digital transformation as the centerpiece
of their growth and profitability strategies moving
forward. To successfully transform, business leaders are recognizing the
need for new ways to harness their most valuable asset - their data.
Becoming
data-centric is no small undertaking. It requires new approaches to
computing now that data is much more distributed, dynamic, and diverse.
Customers also face data integration challenges as they adopt hybrid and
multi cloud models for greater agility, scale, and cost control. IDC
has released a new report, "Worldwide Data Services for Hybrid Cloud
Taxonomy, 2017" that reflects the business opportunities
and IT requirements for enterprises to maximize the value of data in a
hybrid cloud world.
NetApp ushered in the era of simplified data management at its founding 25 years ago. Today, it enables organizations to unleash the full value of their data
for competitive advantage. NetApp is included as a key player by IDC
for its ability to provide hybrid cloud data services. Specifically, IDC
called out the NetApp Data Fabric strategy, which provides consistent
and integrated services that deliver data visibility and insights, data
access and control, and data protection and security.
"Successful
digital organizations exploit data insights to deliver personalized
value services, optimize the customer experience, explore new
opportunities, and reduce the overall cost of doing business," said
Laura DuBois, group vice president, Enterprise Storage, Servers and
Infrastructure Software, at IDC. "Hybrid/multi-cloud deployments are
becoming the new norm for organizations looking to harness data's
potential, but siloed approaches to development are limiting
effectiveness and slowing digital transformation. What's needed is a
comprehensive hybrid cloud data services solution set that delivers a
full range of capabilities, including data protection, security,
compliance, integration, orchestration, and data location optimization,
that span structured and unstructured data, on-premises and cloud.
NetApp, with its Data Fabric approach, is already innovating in these
categories and is making the investments in hybrid cloud data services
to attract new customers to its vision of a data-driven future."
"Data
is the lifeblood of every organization, and today's leaders are under
tremendous pressure to harness the potential of that data to create new
value-with limited time, skills, and budget," said Jean English, chief
marketing officer for NetApp. "Our relentless focus on data drives us to
help solve these customer challenges with new approaches such as the
NetApp Data Fabric. That's why pioneering hybrid cloud data services is a
natural next innovation that gives customers and partners the
confidence to move into the future with NetApp."
NetApp customer Polaris Alpha
is a data visionary whose team, including 400+ software developers, is
key to making the world safer. With major locations in Colorado,
Maryland and Virginia, the high-tech specialist provides custom software
solutions that allow government agencies such as the Department of
Defense and Department of Homeland Security to quickly evaluate
potential threats and make smarter decisions.
The company
undertook an ambitious transformation to embrace a multimodal approach
that required modernizing every aspect of their enterprise IT. They
quickly began transitioning from monolithic applications to cloud-native
containerized technologies. Rapid IT changes resulted in 10% monthly
growth in storage requirements, which increased latency and hampered
productivity. A new converged infrastructure solution provided by
NetApp and partners Cisco and Flair Data Systems delivered the agility
they needed to accelerate time to market.
"Our credibility is our
competitive advantage. Being able to deliver when we say we will makes a
big difference to our credibility and relationships with our customers,
who use our systems to visualize and share massive amounts of data in
support of critical decision-making for U.S. national security across
air, sea, ground, cyber, and space operations," said David Coker, senior
vice president of Information Systems at Polaris Alpha. "With the
solutions and support of NetApp and its partners Cisco and Flair Data
Systems, we have reclaimed time to focus on innovation, increased our
data efficiency, and significantly accelerated the development of new
offerings to meet our customers' unique deployment needs."
NetApp
also unveiled a "Data Visionaries" awareness campaign to drive
visibility of the strategic importance of data. The campaign connects to
content that showcases how NetApp's expertise and Data Fabric portfolio
support customers in their transformation to data-centric organizations
that will lead the future.