The multi-billion dollar strategic alliance with EMC has made Dell the leading reseller of the CLARiiON product line—its standard offering for SAN and NAS installations. Jon Murray, practice leader of the Business Continuance department for EMC ASEAN & India, and Simon Penny, director of storage marketing, Asia Pacific and China for Dell Computer speaks about their plans for the Indian storage market.
How important do you think is the concept of networked storage in the current scenario?
Customers today have both file sharing as well as file traffic needs. Hence, it is no longer practical to have just a SAN or a NAS solution in place. We have fully merged both, and offer our customers what is now called networked storage. We can then deploy whichever is best for the customer’s business. The economic downturn has made customers very cost-conscious, which makes it important for us to offer more at a lesser price. Networked storage enables a company to reduce management cost by minimising the need for administration (by automating and centralising management) by cutting down on the number of licenses required and getting more work done using lesser storage. It offers both unrestricted capacity and a flexible architecture to better manage varying business requirements. Earlier methods of deploying and managing storage devices are no longer pragmatic and also prove costly in the long run.
Customers today have both file sharing as well as file traffic needs. Hence, it is no longer practical to have just a SAN or a NAS solution in place. We have fully merged both, and offer our customers what is now called networked storage. We can then deploy whichever is best for the customer’s business. The economic downturn has made customers very cost-conscious, which makes it important for us to offer more at a lesser price. Networked storage enables a company to reduce management cost by minimising the need for administration (by automating and centralising management) by cutting down on the number of licenses required and getting more work done using lesser storage. It offers both unrestricted capacity and a flexible architecture to better manage varying business requirements. Earlier methods of deploying and managing storage devices are no longer pragmatic and also prove costly in the long run.
What are your offerings for the Indian market?
In the Indian market we have been gaining market share with our CLARiiON CX range of enterprise storage systems. Unlike most storage products that have come earlier, products in the CX range are compatible with each other. And this is our key strength. Also, the interoperability issue is a problem we can alleviate with our products. We launched the CX600, which is the fastest product in its class, for the enterprise segment some months back. We also recently launched the CX400 in India. With this launch we intend to gain market share in the mid-range segment. And with customers looking at centralised management we believe that the CX range of products is the future of the storage industry. The CX400 comes with enhanced software capabilities compared to other products in the CX range. Our CX400 is a versatile, rack-dense mid-range 2 Gbps fibre channel storage system that will deliver cost-effective, continuous availability into business critical SAN or direct attach storage (DAS) applications. The EMC CX400 is priced lower but provides more features compared to other similar products in the mid-range segment. The server will enable customers to benefit from server consolidation, centralised storage management, and disaster recovery. and since the product is highly scalable customers can migrate their storage systems as the need arises. Even backward and future compatibility is assured with our products.
In the Indian market we have been gaining market share with our CLARiiON CX range of enterprise storage systems. Unlike most storage products that have come earlier, products in the CX range are compatible with each other. And this is our key strength. Also, the interoperability issue is a problem we can alleviate with our products. We launched the CX600, which is the fastest product in its class, for the enterprise segment some months back. We also recently launched the CX400 in India. With this launch we intend to gain market share in the mid-range segment. And with customers looking at centralised management we believe that the CX range of products is the future of the storage industry. The CX400 comes with enhanced software capabilities compared to other products in the CX range. Our CX400 is a versatile, rack-dense mid-range 2 Gbps fibre channel storage system that will deliver cost-effective, continuous availability into business critical SAN or direct attach storage (DAS) applications. The EMC CX400 is priced lower but provides more features compared to other similar products in the mid-range segment. The server will enable customers to benefit from server consolidation, centralised storage management, and disaster recovery. and since the product is highly scalable customers can migrate their storage systems as the need arises. Even backward and future compatibility is assured with our products.
What trends do you see in the storage space?
Storage consolidation, business continuity and disaster recovery are the current industry buzzwords. Earlier organisations focussed on connectivity, capacity and some software differences. But in today's business environment these are no longer major issues. Customers are moving away from these decisions to functionality decisions. While RoI still remains at the top of everyone's mind, factors such as interoperability, resilience and improvement in efficiency are fast gaining prominence.
Storage consolidation, business continuity and disaster recovery are the current industry buzzwords. Earlier organisations focussed on connectivity, capacity and some software differences. But in today's business environment these are no longer major issues. Customers are moving away from these decisions to functionality decisions. While RoI still remains at the top of everyone's mind, factors such as interoperability, resilience and improvement in efficiency are fast gaining prominence.
What is your strategy to tap the Indian market?
In India there is an urgent need for storage consolidation. The Indian storage market has seen an increase in volumes. Though the potential is huge there is still a long way to go. The problem with the Indian market is that there is a lack of awareness. Though this attitude has slowly changed over the past few years, there is still a pressing need for education. We have seen an increasing realisation among the small and medium enterprises (SME) segment about the importance of storage and disaster recovery systems and have been tapping this market. The pressure to reduce costs, protect information, gain flexibility and simplify management processes is forcing many of these companies to adopt storage solutions. We have already launched a few products for the mid-range and enterprise segment this year. In the coming year, we will be launching several products targeted at the entry-level segment. We expect the SAN and NAS market to pick up in India by 2004, as the mass market picks up. We plan to strengthen our position in this market.
In India there is an urgent need for storage consolidation. The Indian storage market has seen an increase in volumes. Though the potential is huge there is still a long way to go. The problem with the Indian market is that there is a lack of awareness. Though this attitude has slowly changed over the past few years, there is still a pressing need for education. We have seen an increasing realisation among the small and medium enterprises (SME) segment about the importance of storage and disaster recovery systems and have been tapping this market. The pressure to reduce costs, protect information, gain flexibility and simplify management processes is forcing many of these companies to adopt storage solutions. We have already launched a few products for the mid-range and enterprise segment this year. In the coming year, we will be launching several products targeted at the entry-level segment. We expect the SAN and NAS market to pick up in India by 2004, as the mass market picks up. We plan to strengthen our position in this market.
This article first appeared in Express Computer.
Comments
Post a Comment