#168 – Storage Unicorns

#168 – Storage Unicorns

Chris EvansGarbage Collection, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week Chris and Martin review the idea of storage unicorns, companies that have a valuation of one billion dollars or more. What exactly is the basis or justification for a billion dollar price tag? Is this something invented by the VC industry or is there a real degree of science behind the assumptions? The list in question comes from a Blocks & Files article written by Chris Mellor, which in turn references the list produced by an analyst firm. While valuation based on some multiple of money invested does give some indication of value, …

#139 – Storage Predictions for 2020 (Part II)

#139 – Storage Predictions for 2020 (Part II)

Chris EvansContainers, Data Management, Data Protection, Garbage Collection

This is the second of our predictions shows for 2020 that anticipates what we can expect in enterprise storage for the year ahead. This episode covers solutions and vendors. We open with a discussion on cloud-native storage, which saw a lot of traction in 2019. Will the future be one of these companies or as Chris says, should we just rely on VMware to underpin our container environments? The discussion moves on to object storage and in particular a look at a company called MinIO. As an open-source solution with S3 compatibility, MinIO could be …

#75 – It’s ILM All Over Again with Chris Mellor

#75 – It's ILM All Over Again with Chris Mellor

Chris EvansData Management, Garbage Collection

Data volumes have always increased over time as we store more information with the hope that one day some of it will be useful.  Even 30 years ago on the mainframe, Information Lifecycle Management or ILM was a thing with tools like DFHSM used to move content around between disk and tape.  This week Martin, Chris Evans and Chris Mellor talk about the new range of data management or ILM products that are looking to resolve the current issues of data sprawl. How do these products work?  It is all about data ingest, or just …

#64 – Success & Failure in Storage Startup Land

#64 – Success & Failure in Storage Startup Land

Chris EvansGarbage Collection

This week’s conversation follows up on Chris’ recent visit to Flash Memory Summit in the US.  Chris and Martin discuss the storage startup landscape and the range of companies appearing at the event. What makes a company successful?  Is IPO or acquisition the right route?  The discussion starts with a simple, yet tricky question – why does storage continue to be such a diverse market place, with so many solutions to problems?  We see a storage “pendulum” effect, with vendors moving between hardware and software.  At the moment, there seems to be more focus on …