In our previous article, we described how the industry consensus has come around to articulating the vision that hybrid multicloud is the next big thing. NetApp could have told you the same thing more than four years ago. In fact, NetApp did tell you the same thing more than four years ago.
Here’s the language NetApp used to describe its innovative Data Fabric technology back in 2015:
The Data Fabric is NetApp’s strategy for simplifying and integrating the orchestration of data services across a choice of hybrid multicloud environments.
Nobody else was talking about hybrid multicloud back then. Now, everyone is talking about it. Having a vision several years ahead of the curve has provided NetApp, its customers and its cloud partners with a path that allows them to continue leveraging innovation ahead of the competition.
Today, NetApp’s hybrid cloud infrastructure (HCI) solutions provide enterprises and cloud service providers with a range of capabilities that competitors are hard-pressed to match. These include:
- Three-dimensional quality of service (QoS) capabilities that deliver predictable performance across all applications.
- Independent compute and storage resources that provide the flexibility to scale when and how you want.
- Simplified deployment and ongoing management capabilities for IT automated infrastructure that lowers costs, accelerates speed to market and minimizes risks.
- Ability to leverage the full potential of data across the entire hybrid multicloud environment, using the Data Fabric to eliminate silos.
- Data and workload mobility across on-premises hybrid cloud infrastructure and public cloud services.
- Ability to orchestrate all container environments across all clouds.
Predictable performance for multiple applications in the cloud
Delivering predictable performance across the hybrid cloud is just one of many examples of how using the right infrastructure platform can enable the hybrid multicloud experience. This capability is particularly relevant for enterprises using multiple clouds for different applications and workloads, as well as for cloud service providers supporting multiple customers.
One of the biggest challenges for any data center is delivering predictable performance in the face of proliferating applications and workloads. In cloud environments, you typically have multiple applications sharing the same infrastructure, creating the potential for one application to interfere with the performance of another.
Traditionally, when multiple applications share the same infrastructure, all performance resources are freely available to all applications, all the time, across the shared resources. Without a more precise resource allocation, one application or “noisy neighbor” can easily consume an unfair share of the resources, leaving little available for others.
With NetApp HCI, cloud providers and users use QoS settings to eliminate the resource contention and variable application performance caused by noisy neighbors. Each volume on the system gets its own minimum, maximum and burst settings, providing predictable performance for each application without incurring the capacity sprawl and low utilization common in today’s hyper-converged infrastructures.
Non-disruptive scaling is another example of NetApp’s advantage. With a node-based, share-nothing architecture, you can scale compute and storage independently. Each new node delivers a precise amount of virtualization or storage performance and capacity for a predictable pattern of scalability. Application placement is automatically load-balanced in the background. This simplifies operations for IT personnel and eliminates downtime.
Conclusion
By being one of the first companies to articulate the vision that the world is moving to a hybrid multicloud environment, NetApp has been able to design it’s entire product line and strategy with that vision in mind. This has provided enterprise and cloud service provider customers with significant advantages in deploying infrastructure that is integrated, low friction, self-service and automated.
But there’s plenty more to come, particularly in cloud orchestration, support for container environments, and leveraging analytics and artificial intelligence—all supporting the vision that you should be able to consume infrastructure and cloud resources seamlessly across multiple clouds as well as your on-premises private cloud infrastructure.
