Large Biotech Firm Expands Data Center and Reduces Overheating With Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform G1000 Introduction Biotech companies produce groundbreaking treatments that improve the quality of life for people around the world. To achieve their breakthroughs, these firms work with massive amounts of data and require extremely high processing speeds throughout the research and development process. This approach can lead to challenges in the data center: Such high demands often lead to rising costs, man- agement headaches and problems with the placement of equipment in the data center due to overheating and lack of floor space. When a global biotech company was nearing capacity in its data center and needed to expand within the same complex, it implemented Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) G1000. The virtualized storage platform enabled the firm to expand its data center within the same campus with 80% less effort than alternative technologies. The company was also able to address its overheating problem, reduce management complexity and operational costs, and scale as needed to continue developing life-saving innovations. Challenges: High Demands, Limited Space The global biotech firm works on hundreds of research projects involving devel- opment of products and technologies to combat everything from rare diseases to inefficient manufacturing processes. The research requires a massive amount of structured and unstructured data, which must be stored, managed and analyzed efficiently and cost-effectively. USE CASE Virtualized Storage Platform Supports Agile, Low-Cost Expansion Challenges ■ Data center nearing capacity and hardware running too hot. ■ Rising capital and operational costs. ■ Management complexity: siloed data storage. ■ Need faster scalability to meet business demands. Solution ■ Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform G1000. ■ Built-in active-active capability 1 . ■ Extended connection for flexible placement. ■ Hitachi Dynamic Tiering for automated storage tiering. ■ Hitachi Command Suite. ■ Simplifies storage management. ■ Lowers cost and complexity. Benefits ■ Expanded data center within same complex with 80% less effort than competitive solutions. ■ Reduced overheating and lowered power and cooling costs. ■ Reduced required floor space by 30%. ■ Consolidated management with end-to-end vir- tualization to prevent physical server sprawl. ■ Scalable infrastructure supports critical applica- tions with zero downtime. 1 Separately licensed feature available after initial release. Ask your HDS representative or partner for more information. TRANSFORM VIRTUALIZATION ECONOMICS INNOVA TRUSTED INFORMATION GLOBAL CHANGE INTELLIGENT TECHN VALUE INSIGHT OPPORTUNITY SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE INTEG INNOVATE
Transcript
Large Biotech Firm Expands Data Center and Reduces Overheating With Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform G1000
IntroductionBiotech companies produce groundbreaking treatments that improve the quality of life for people around the world. To achieve their breakthroughs, these firms work with massive amounts of data and require extremely high processing speeds throughout the research and development process. This approach can lead to challenges in the data center: Such high demands often lead to rising costs, man-agement headaches and problems with the placement of equipment in the data center due to overheating and lack of floor space.
When a global biotech company was nearing capacity in its data center and needed to expand within the same complex, it implemented Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) G1000. The virtualized storage platform enabled the firm to expand its data center within the same campus with 80% less effort than alternative technologies. The company was also able to address its overheating problem, reduce management complexity and operational costs, and scale as needed to continue developing life-saving innovations.
Challenges: High Demands, Limited SpaceThe global biotech firm works on hundreds of research projects involving devel-opment of products and technologies to combat everything from rare diseases to inefficient manufacturing processes. The research requires a massive amount of structured and unstructured data, which must be stored, managed and analyzed efficiently and cost-effectively.
■ Hitachi Dynamic Tiering for automated storage tiering.
■ Hitachi Command Suite.
■ Simplifies storage management.
■ Lowers cost and complexity.
Benefits ■ Expanded data center within same complex with 80% less effort than competitive solutions.
■ Reduced overheating and lowered power and cooling costs.
■ Reduced required floor space by 30%.
■ Consolidated management with end-to-end vir-tualization to prevent physical server sprawl.
■ Scalable infrastructure supports critical applica-tions with zero downtime.
1 Separately licensed feature available after initial release. Ask your HDS representative or partner for more information.
Transform VirTualizaTion Economics innoVaTE rEliablE TrusTEd informaTion Global chanGE inTElliGEnT TEchnoloGy sErVicEs ValuE insiGhT opporTuniTy social infrasTrucTurE inTEGraTE analyzE dis-
Notice: This document is for informational purposes only, and does not set forth any warranty, expressed or implied, concerning any equipment or service offered or to be offered by Hitachi Data Systems Corporation.
UC-006-A DG April 2014
Corporate Headquarters 2845 Lafayette StreetSanta Clara, CA 95050-2639 USAwww.HDS.com community.HDS.com
As one of the company’s existing data centers neared capacity, perfor-mance began to suffer and the servers were running at unsustainably hot tem-peratures. Siloed storage solutions contributed to the problem, as they were complex to manage and required a growing amount of floor space. Yet, they failed to offer a cost-effective way to scale to meet the company’s continually growing needs.
To support its data center expansion, the bio-tech firm upgraded to the Hitachi VSP G1000 virtualized storage platform.
Solution: Hitachi VSP G1000 VSP G1000 is a virtualized disk storage system that enabled the biotech firm to improve its storage performance while also reducing operating costs and management complexity. The solution provides a fault- tolerant, cost-effective platform that the com-pany can eventually use to develop a resilient private cloud infrastructure.
To support the data center expansion within the same physical complex, the company depended on the extended connection feature, which separated VSP G1000 into multiple parts. This feature gave the company flexibility to place the storage systems wher-ever they would best address the overheating challenges. VSP G1000 further supported energy efficiency by requiring 30% less floor space than competitive solutions and reduc-ing heating and cooling requirements.
Another key element of the solution was Hitachi Dynamic Tiering software, which enabled the biotech firm to adopt a tiered storage infrastructure. Dynamic Tiering
automates data placement. Therefore, the company no longer needs to spend time on manual data movement and can use a cost-optimized, energy-efficient mix of flash storage and traditional and high-density disks.
To manage the new storage environment, the company relies on Hitachi Command Suite software, which provides unified management across all the virtualized storage resources. Through a single console, IT administrators were able to discover, configure, analyze, optimize and protect storage resources. Command Suite increased automation and has enabled the company to accelerate the deployment of new business applications.
Benefits: Simple Expansion, Improved Performance VSP G1000 enabled the biotech firm to expand its overburdened data center with 80% less effort than competing technolo-gies. The company also gained the flexibility to place storage systems where necessary to reduce overheating. It was able to create a more sustainable data center with lower power, cooling and footprint requirements.
The virtualized storage solution optimizes support for critical applications, cloud-ready infrastructure and data center consolida-tions, all through a single intuitive interface.
In addition, VSP G1000 provides a more efficient, agile and easy-to-manage solution compared to the company’s previous siloed storage solutions.
Dynamic Tiering software reduces IT work-loads and increases cost-optimizations through automated data placement. At the same time, Hitachi Command Suite has enabled the company to simplify and automate storage management, resulting in substantial reductions in operational costs.
ConclusionAs the most robust, highest-performing hardware platform on the market today, Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform G1000 is an ideal solution for the biotech industry. The always-on platform and associated software enabled the global biotech firm to expand its data center quickly and easily. It also helped to create a more flexible and sustainable data center with a smaller storage footprint, lower power and cooling costs, and lower opera-tional costs overall.
Building a foundation based on Hitachi VSP G1000 gives the biotech company a clear roadmap for the future. The solution provides the agility and massive scalability that the company needs. It not only expands to meet the firm’s future demands but also does so in a fast, efficient and cost-effective way that supports continued innovation and growth.
■■ 100% availability guarantee.
■■ Active-active platform for all data types.
■■ Petabyte-scale performance of more than 3 million transactions per second.
■■ Scalability up to 8 virtual storage director pairs and 2TB of single-image global cache.
■■ Global clustering.
■■ Nondisruptive upgrades.
■■ Nondisruptive data movement, copy and migration.
HIGHLIGHtS of HItACHI VIrtuAL StorAGE PLAtform G1000
