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Haters gonna hate, hate, hate: Cisco to tailor SwiftStack for UCS object storage cramming

Reseller deal dodges rivals

Cisco has decided to get into object storage with its UCS servers – and has done so with a SwiftStack reseller deal, avoiding object suppliers allied to its server competitors.

SwiftStack provides the OpenStack Swift object storage software and has been a Cisco partner for some time. In January, Cisco released a SwiftStack reference architecture, Scalable Object Storage with SwiftStack and Cisco Unified Computing System, specifying how to design a UCS-based object storage system with LDAP and Active Directory integration, S3 support, CIFS/NFS access via the optional SwiftStack Filesystem Gateway, and 24x7 enterprise support.

The example use cases were enterprise backup, active archive, Web application data repositories, file sync and share and general private cloud storage.

Now this meet-in-the-channel deal has been augmented by a reselling arrangement. This is less of a commitment than Cisco's OEM deal for hyper-converged supplier Springpath's software used in Cisco's HyperFlex offering.

Its main server competitors generally have in-house or OEM'd object storage system offerings:

  • Dell – OEMs Scality
  • EMC – Centera, Atmos and ECS
  • IBM – acquired CleverSafe in SoftLayer cloud, which also used Swift
  • HDS – acquired Archivas software in HCP
  • HPE – Scality OEM deal
  • Lenovo – deals with Cloudian

Huawei is an unknown quantity. NetApp has its StorageGRID offering, the acquired Bycast product. Quantum has its Lattus product. DDN has its Web Object Scaler and WDC, through its HGST subsidiary, acquired Amplidata.

Then there are various object storage software suppliers such as Basho, Versity and others. All in all there is a lot of competition, but Cisco's channel is Cisco's channel and when it goes active with a product, that product can fly. ®

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