EDITOR ’ S QUESTION

As a result , organisations that are looking to increase competitiveness by maximising the value of data , must update their storage infrastructure to create business opportunities .

In data storage – which touches every IT-driven business – the pace of innovation is accelerating , yet most enterprises continue to struggle with data ’ s explosive growth and velocity . Getting the highest use and value from their data is becoming ever more critical for organisations , especially for those with data stores reaching exabyte scale . So , this brings us to the real question . What are some of the enterprise data storage practices that would help unlock the real value of data capital ?

Firstly , it is important for organisations to refresh their storage hardware on a regular basis and keep up with the increased data demands by eliminating aging infrastructure that is more susceptible to failures that cause outages or downtime . Modern storage infrastructure can also reduce the data silos and the struggle to manage messy data . It also frequently includes advanced data protection features that help ensure the on-premises data remains safe and secure .

Data encryption adds an additional layer of protection to this , improving data security and mitigating the potential for data loss . Second , as we look at technology requirements today and beyond 2021 , one thing is clear . Storage will be architected and consumed as softwaredefined and the lines between storage and compute will continue to blur as organisations demand unparalleled agility and simplicity for business-critical IT infrastructure to respond effectively to rapidly changing market dynamics . Dell ’ s customers are telling the company they are looking for more flexibility in their traditional Storage Area Networks ( SANs ), wishing to have compute as close to storage as possible to support data-centric workloads and to reduce operational complexity .

This is because software-defined approaches combine industry-standard hardware components and protocols with software to pool and manage resources within modern data centres . And for organisations that require the flexibility of rapidly scaling storage and compute independently of each other or need to consolidate multiple high performance or general workloads , Software-Defined Infrastructure ( SDI ) becomes a viable alternative to traditional SANs and hyper-converged infrastructure ( HCI ) for certain workloads .

With Software-Defined Architecture ( SDA ), disruptive and costly data migrations are a thing of the past .

For organisations , that means better business execution , increased revenue opportunities and more productive teams . This is important because in today ’ s data era , having an agile , flexible foundation for IT infrastructure is more critical than ever before . p

WithSoftware-Defined Architecture ( SDA ), disruptive and costly data migrations are a thing of the past . For organisations , that means better business execution , increased revenue opportunities and more productive teams .

WALID YEHIA , SENIOR DIRECTOR , PRESALES – DELL TECHNOLOGIES , MIDDLE EAST , RUSSIA , AFRICA AND TURKEY

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