In this edition of Newsbytes we will look at the highlights from two fascinating studies. The first is published by Solutions North Consulting and it examines the economic, social and governance impacts of retained data. The report considers the benefits of using LTO-9 data storage technology as compared to hard disk and cloud solutions to optimize data value. Then Newsbytes will review the key points from a new report by Allied Market Research that examines artificial intelligence (AI) in the marketplace for key disk storage technologies. And, as always, you will get the news about the next events for the LTO Program. Here we go!
CAN YOU OPTIMIZE DATA VALUE?
The quick answer to the question, “Can you optimize data value?” is a resounding “Yes indeed”!
The Solutions North Consulting study uncovered a wealth of information regarding data value and data retention. The report predicts that by the year 2030, archive data that is infrequently accessed but must be retained for long term or even indefinite periods, will be six times the amount of so-called ‘active’ or production data. The report noted that management of these data archives will entail a number of key management activities including:
- Custodianship
- Budget management
- Technology modernization planning
- Expiration planning
The report illustrates that “the economics of data becomes the primary driver for IT professionals, including cost of ownership, technology refresh management and the growing focus on carbon impact of storage technologies.”
There is a wealth of key management strategies in the Solutions North document including a section where three solutions are examined for long term data retention across a 10 year Total Cost of Ownership time period: HDD, Tape and Cloud. The results in the report showed that an all-LTO-9 tape solution was 83% less costly than an all-HDD solution and 95% less costly than an all-cloud solution. Regarding data protection, the report explains that LTO-9 provides the absolute final line of defense against cyber intrusion. See the full report here.
AI STORAGE REPORT REVEALS KEY STATS
In the other study mentioned in the introduction, Allied Market Research has published a comprehensive report that examines AI in the marketplace for key disk storage technologies.
This high interest study provides “an in-depth analysis of the AI-powered storage market along with the current trends and future estimations to elucidate the imminent investment pockets.”
There are a great number of eye-catching findings in the study including that “The global AI-powered storage market was valued at $15.58 billion in 2021, and is projected to reach $162.48 billion by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 26.7% from 2021 to 2031.”. The following chart from the report shows the software and hardware components of this projection.
The AI-Powered storage market, by component, 2021-2031 ($Million)
What the chart highlights is that massive growth AI technology usage is expected to generate huge amounts of mission critical data putting pressure on the storage infrastructure to secure the data and control costs. The report states, “[A] Key factor impacting [the] growth of AI-powered storage market includes [the] evolution of cyber threats. With new technological advancements, new threats are also evolving, which is a concerning factor for various enterprises.”
Protecting company data assets from cyber-threats, sabotage, natural disasters and accidental deletion is a critical task for storage executives. One of the essential responsibilities is to make data inaccessible to attack and destruction. Storing a copy of critical information offline is a must. LTO tape technology is famous for providing offline secure storage. As such, tape technology is the perfect complement to primary and secondary disk-based architectures, particularly for AI workloads and applications that are capacity intensive (versus GPU-intensive) and can tolerate lower IOPS and throughput.
LTO tape technology can be considered as an AI analytics storage tier for the following reasons:
- it offers huge density advantages in terms of TB/sq.ft
- at a technology level it has much greater potential for scaling out to meet the coming explosion of data than hard disk technology
- It is the lowest cost mass storage platform by a huge margin
- it is faster than SATA HDD for specific types of capacity-intensive workloads – e.g. streaming homologous or concurrent data sets
- it has a better fit with corporate sustainability requirements that seem certain to be a key factor in IT procurement for AI in the future
- it supports both file and object formats, both structured and unstructured
Plus storing tapes offline hardens ransomware protection via the creation of a true, physical airgap that traditional command and control methods cannot breach.
This massive report goes in depth to explore a vast number of worldwide market segments, growth factors, opportunities and forecasts by region. The report includes a breakdown of the AI-Powered Storage Market by a number of factors including by storage system, storage architecture and end user. Suffice it to say there is a wealth of enlightening information to garner in the Allied Market Research report. Available for a download fee here.
CATCHING UP ON BLOGBYTES
Check out this revealing LTO BlogBytes article called Examining Sustainability for Data Storage. What is sustainability, what are the data storage implications and how can these objectives be attained? These topics and more are examined in this edition of LTO BlogBytes.
WHAT’S NEXT FOR THE LTO PROGRAM
The LTO Program is heading to London for the Gartner IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference from November 20-21 at booth number 403, and then on to Las Vegas from December 5-7 at booth number 445. Come see us there and follow us on LinkedIn for more news and updates from the show.
