Hewlett-Packard Co has come up with Simply StorageWorks, a strategy which brings together solutions and services to help small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) better manage their storage environment. IZWAN ISMAIL recently visited HP’s facilities in Houston, United States, to understand firsthand the company’s commitment to storage and the SMB community.

The HP disk-to-disk backup system

Marcilio points out that all Simply StorageWorks solutions are designed from the ground up.

Vallhonrat says storage utilisation can be raised to at least 50 per cent through consolidation.

FOR small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), the need for good storage solutions has become more pressing than ever due to the growing volume of digital information and stiff competition. But because of their lack of expertise and budget constraints, deciding on the type of storage technology can be a daunting task.

Enter Hewlett-Packard’s Simply StorageWorks, which has been designed based on the key priorities of SMBs that match both business and storage priorities.

“On the business front, Simply StorageWorks will help SMBs meet customer satisfaction, control expenses, grow top-line revenue and reach new markets. The solutions will also provide continuity and disaster recovery, capacity planning for growth, and data management and storage tiering,” said HP’s director, worldwide volume marketing, StorageWorks division Denise Marcilio.

Simply StorageWorks is made up of three parts: Simply Storage Consolidation, which is shared storage for file serving and application data; Simply Business Protection, which is for reliable backup and recovery for business continuity; and Simply Business Solutions, which is storage optimised for specific IT and application.

“All Simply StorageWorks solutions are designed from the ground up, not simplified versions of the enterprise storage solutions. This is because there is no solution that fits all, so these solutions are customised to meet the specific needs of SMBs,” Marcilio pointed out.



Key benefits

Simply StorageWorks helps SMBs to manage huge volumes of unstructured data and move to a virtual server or clustered server environment.

“The major drivers for this technology are growing storage volumes and high storage management costs,” said HP’s product marketing manager, entry-level storage area network, StorageWorks division Charles Vallhonrat.

“Companies cannot afford to manage and have individual storage for every application, hence the need to consolidate.”

Currently, only 30 per cent of storage space is used on the average server. Through consolidation, SMBs will get more value from their storage investments because storage utilisation can be raised to at least 50 per cent, Vallhonrat pointed out.

HP’s latest offerings under Simply StorageWorks are the MSA (Modular Smart Array) 2000 and All-in-One storage system. The former is a low-cost but scalable and high-performance storage consolidation system for entry to mid-range servers and SANs while the latter is designed to deliver simplicity and affordability for businesses to grow, manage and protect their data without having to understand storage technology.



Protecting the business

To protect SMBs from data loss or downtime, HP is offering a new disk-to-disk backup system under Simply Business Protection.

“Disk-based backup systems can enhance data protection for businesses of any size. Compared to a tape-based system, the new disk-to-disk system allows SMBs to store a large amount of data in a smaller footprint,” said HP’s product marketing manager, Nearline Storage division Rick Sellers.

HP also has incorporated de-duplication technology into its business protection and backup solutions to prevent data from being copied over and over again, and to allow companies to leverage on up to 50 times more capacity to ensure their business has reliable and faster access to stored data.

Besides that, HP has come up with a removable disk backup system designed for entry-level backup. “The solution is simple and targeted at SMBs who do not know anything about IT. It’s a drag-and-drop file backup system,” Sellers explained.

Meanwhile, Simply Business Solutions offers shared storage and data protection for any vertical or application environment. It presents storage in an integrated context that includes consolidation and business protection designed for business environments such as VMware, File and Print, Microsoft Exchange 2007, SAP, Oracle and SQL Server.