IBM tackles ‘NAS limitations’ with Panzura software

IBM is to resell Panzura’s Freedom Cloud NAS together with IBM Cloud Object Storage (COS), as a subscription license.

In a blog discussing the announcement yesterday, IBM WW cloud storage portfolio marketing manager David Wolhford revealed the rationale for the reseller deal.

The combination of Panzura Freedom Cloud NAS with IBM Cloud Object Storage overcomes the limitations of network-attached storage (NAS), according to Wohlford.

“Traditional NAS has seen better days,” he wrote. “IDC estimates that scale-up file storage is shrinking and expected to decline 5.0 per cent CAGR for 2017-2022.”

Panzura CEO Patrick Harr said enterprise businesses ”require the scale and durability of a modern object store with the performance and features of a traditional NAS solution.”

“Our partnership with IBM enables enterprise customers to easily migrate their file-based applications without rewrite, converge their primary and secondary storage and collaborate globally from a single, scalable platform.”

Panzura and IBM Cloud Object Storage

In this tie-up, IBM’s COS is the central repository and Panzura makes file-based apps cloud-capable and available on COS. File storage can be migrated to COS without interruption to workflows or applications.

Users get local access to files from cloud-attached storage, based on Panzura’s cloud storage gateway and file sharing technology.

Freedom Cloud NAS uses Panzura’s CloudFS filesystem and supports file and object access.

IBM diagram showing Panzura and COS. PCFS is Panzura Cloud File System.