HP Stows StorageApps Away

Palo Alto, Calif.’s Hewlett-Packard Co. Wednesday made a
major move to fatten its storage management strategy Wednesday by buying
Bridgewater, N.J.’s software maker StorageApps for $350 million in stock.

HP inked the deal to help customers set up and manage storage networks more
easily. In usurping StorageApp’s technology, HP will also be able to allow
customers to pool storage devices from different vendors, add capacity and
move data among the devices independent of server operating systems or
network infrastructure. This lets customers choose the best storage
technology for their needs — basically how far they want to scale. Such
interoperability and ability to scale is key among so many hybridized
networks.

In a much broader sense, the play is consistent with HP’s formal-sounding
Federated Storage Area Management (FSAM) strategy, in which the firm has
pledged to help businesses meet the challenge of managing expanding storage
systems. HP’s goal with FSAM is to help customers increase their storage by
a factor of ten without additional manpower.

HP Wednesday also joined forces with Adaptec Inc. to
accelerate the adoption of storage networking solutions based on Internet
protocols — the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) iSCSI group.
The solution will include Adaptec’s AEA-7111C iSCSI host bus adapter, HP
switches, tape libraries, disk arrays and HP OpenView management software.

iSCSI said the teaming of HP and Adaptec is a major design win for iSCSI and
it will enable IT managers to grow SANs based on their existing Ethernet
infrastructure. Formed this past April, the iSCSI group seeks to promote the
iSCI standard, which was created to transmit block-level data over native IP
storage area networks (SANs).

“Our research indicates quality, reliability and strong technical support
are important SAN purchasing criteria,” said Robert Gray, director of
storage research for International Data Corporation (IDC). “The HP and
Adaptec announcement, coming from well known suppliers, is an important
ratification of IP storage. This agreement helps position both companies to
be strong IP storage vendors.”

IP storage capitalizes on existing Ethernet infrastructure and IT staff
competency and to build SANs; its goal is minimize interoperability issues
and allow IT managers to enhance the performance of their data storage.

The pact between HP and Milpitas, Calif.’s Adaptec complements HP’s storage
networking strategy (and StorageApps purchase) to deliver complete networked
storage solutions based on the emerging iSCSI standard.

Nora Denzel, vice president and general manager, HP Network Storage
Solutions Organization, said the purchase of Storage Apps makes her firm a
complete networked storage solutions provider.

“StorageApps virtualization accelerates our FSAM momentum and allows
customers to more quickly and efficiently take advantage of new technology
while protecting their legacy investments,” Denzel said. “This gives
customers freedom of choice to mix and match storage technologies from many
vendors, allow storage devices to be connected to the network as they are
needed and move data between different vendors’ storage devices.”

The transaction is intended to be structured as a tax-free reorganization
and accounted for as a purchase. Upon completion of the transaction,
StorageApps will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of HP.