Cloud storage enables companies to better face challenges

Cloud storage caters to new trends

Whether it's a public cloud or a private cloud, the key to success is building a proper server, storage, and network infrastructure in which all resources are used and shared efficiently. Because all data resides on the same storage system, storage is particularly important in shared infrastructure patterns.

It is already clear that, in terms of computing, server virtualization provides a suitable infrastructure for cloud services, because this technology, when needed to change, can effectively divide computing resources and quickly allocate, increase, reduce, or unassign resources. A series of rapidly maturing virtualization management services can also help improve speed, flexibility, and higher availability. Leading cloud service providers such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) are already using this approach to take full advantage of the latest virtualization technologies.

The pressure to reduce storage-operation costs and to spend less is greater than ever, due to the economic downturn, especially in the face of accelerated data growth. Traditional storage technology is not designed for use in the multi-PB Web 2.0 era, and if a traditional storage architecture is used, a new storage array will be added when capacity requirements increase. As the number of arrays that need to be managed grows, the storage environment becomes increasingly complex, management is more difficult, and higher operating costs are required. This has brought more disadvantages to the business-extending time-to-market, reducing productivity, and weakening flexibility.

A concomitant challenge is that file-based data is growing much faster than block based data, due to the explosive growth of digital content. By 2012, more than 80% of the storage capacity will be used for file data, according to industry analysts. This is not just for primary storage systems, but also for systems that store copies of data for use in data protection, disaster recovery, test development, archiving, and collaboration. While traditional storage technology continues to perform well in areas that are inherently good, that is, transactional computing, this solution is powerless to curb the growing trend of file-based data. These factors are prompting users to consider new storage deployment patterns, such as cloud storage.

Cloud storage is provided as a service through subscription mode. A service provider can be a company's internal IT group (a private cloud), a third-party company that specializes in providing storage services (a public cloud), or a mixed form of both (a mixed cloud). The economic benefits of cloud storage benefit both service providers and enterprise customers. Service providers gain economies of scale through a multi-tenant infrastructure, as well as predictable recurring revenue. The benefit of the enterprise is the ability to dynamically allocate and deallocate storage resources, provide level-appropriate storage capacity and data protection, and thus have the flexibility to extend storage