Study: 70 Percent of Companies Worldwide Increasingly Worried About Cost, Performance and Complexity of Traditional Data Storage

NUREMBERG, Germany, March 1, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Traditional enterprise storage strategies may not be keeping up with the exponential growth of business data and are under the microscope in 70 percent of IT organizations, according to a study commissioned and released by enterprise open source infrastructure solution provider SUSE®.

The study found the vast majority of companies have revised their storage approach and strategy in the last 12 months due to frustrations associated with storage costs, performance, complexity and fragmentation of existing solutions. And a majority of them are looking at software-defined storage to help bridge the gap.

Sixty percent say storage expenses are under increased scrutiny from other areas of the business, and an overwhelming majority of companies – 95 percent – are reporting interest in the scalability and efficiency of software-defined storage. Sixty-three percent say they will begin to adopt a software-defined storage approach in the next year.

The majority of respondents currently have hybrid flash & disk (62 percent) or disk-based systems (61 percent) in place, with most experiencing the following common challenges:

• High costs: 80 percent of all respondents report frustration with the cost of their storage system, and 92 percent are worried about managing storage costs as capacity requirements grow. Overall, an average 7 percent of IT budgets are allocated to data storage, consistent across all countries.
• Performance concerns: Nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of senior IT staff report being frustrated with the performance of their existing storage solution. And 92 percent are worried that storage will slow down their digital transformation initiatives as a result of data growth.
• Growing complexity and fragmentation: 71 percent of respondents said storage systems were complex and highly fragmented. As a result, companies' most commonly reported priority in the next 12 months is to simplify their storage approach.

"In today's economy, every company is essentially a data storage company," said Joseph George, SUSE vice president of Solution Strategy. "They are archiving email, distributing large video files, and are now starting to store petabytes of data, often for years due to record retention policies and regulatory requirements. Storage is at an inflection point where traditional storage approaches are being reevaluated in light of growing data demands and more scalable, affordable options. Fortunately, there is a steady stream of innovation coming from the open source community to help enterprises ease cost and implementation frustrations. These survey results underscore the need for companies to examine a more flexible approach to meeting the ever-growing need for data storage without breaking the bank."

SUSE is working with the Ceph open source project to deliver storage technology that's intelligent, scalable and cost effective. For more information about software-defined storage in the enterprise, visit www.suse.com/storage.

About the Study
The independent market research conducted by Loudhouse surveyed more than 1,200 senior IT decision-makers in 11 countries across a wide variety of industries. All respondents work for organizations with more than 250 employees, with 56 percent representing companies larger than 1,000. Study results can be found at www.suse.com/stateofstorage.

About SUSE
SUSE, a pioneer in open source software, provides reliable, interoperable Linux, cloud infrastructure and storage solutions that give enterprises greater control and flexibility. More than 20 years of engineering excellence, exceptional service and an unrivaled partner ecosystem power the products and support that help our customers manage complexity, reduce cost, and confidently deliver mission-critical services. The lasting relationships we build allow us to adapt and deliver the smarter innovation they need to succeed – today and tomorrow. For more information, visit www.suse.com.

Copyright 2017 SUSE LLC. All rights reserved. SUSE and the SUSE logo are registered trademarks of SUSE LLC in the United States and other countries. All third-party trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

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