Pure Storage unifies global go-to-market team

Pure Storage has confirmed to B&F that it has broken up its specialist regional FlashBlade sales teams amid the creation of a single global go-to-market organization.

FlashBlade is Pure’s scale-out all-flash file and object storage array used as a backup target and fast restore system, as well as for fast file and object storage. It complements Pure’s main FlashArray line of all-flash block storage arrays. Increasingly the two product lines have been using common components. For example, the FlashBlade//S uses the same Direct Flash Modules, Pure’s proprietary flash drives, as the FlashArray//C.

A Pure spokesperson told us: “Pure continues to grow and innovate at a rapid pace, releasing a record number of new products and services in 2022. As a result, we have unified our global go-to-market organization to enable our customers to leverage the full portfolio of products, solutions and services.” 

Sources told us the separate FlashBlade sales teams had been shuttered, with their salespeople informed that they can apply to be a rep selling FlashArray (core systems) or look for employment outside the company. Low-end FlashBlade customers are being presented with alternative FlashArray//X or //C systems. The background is that FlashBlade no longer needs specialized sales teams as it has become a mainstream product.

This information came from Pure people looking for job posts in competing suppliers.

Pure Storage FlashBlade
FlashBlade//S front view

The latest FlashBlade//S is sold into markets such as AI/ ML, high-volume analytics, rapid restore for backups and ransomware recovery, manufacturing, high-performance simulation and EDA, medical and enterprise imaging, and genomics. Pure claims it has unmatched storage efficiency compared to any other scale-out storage system on the market. That means customers can save on their power spending by using FlashBlade//S.

The spokesperson said: “FlashBlade is a great example of a successful growth engine for Pure, surpassing $1 billion in lifetime sales all while being recognized as an industry leader by Gartner for Distributed File Systems and Object Storage.” 

Both FlashBlade and FlashArray use the Purity operating system.