That’s what a recent study from Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) shows customers of Pure Storage® save—while also gaining up to 2.6 times greater storage efficiency.
Storage efficiency is key. The incredible density of flash media compared to spinning (hard) disk storage is one reason so many IT organizations are moving their data storage to all-flash arrays. Flash means big savings on space, power, cooling, and hosting fees. And who isn’t looking to save on their IT budget, right? These savings are on top of the performance, ease of management, and reliability that come with modern enterprise-grade all-flash systems, like those from Pure Storage.
Storage vendors have sought for years to fit more data into less space. This became even more important with the move to all-flash systems. Pure has been a proven leader in this space since the early days of flash, with our investment in always-on, advanced data-reduction technologies. Our products deliver results typically two-times better than other storage vendors (our global average total efficiency is 10:1).
Competing claims about efficiency can cause confusion about which flash solution is most efficient, and thus save you more money in the long run. The bottom line: Make sure you’re getting the right capacity for your needs, rather than too much—or, worse—too little.
Figure 1. Efficiency results across industries.
ESG Helps Clear Up the Confusion
To help shed some light on the subject of storage efficiency and model real-world savings, Pure Storage commissioned ESG to conduct a detailed survey and report. Using a combination of its research and economic validation services, ESG validated the effectiveness of Pure’s storage-efficiency technology when compared against alternative solutions and technologies in real-world deployments.
In ESG’s Economic Validation report, “Validating the Economics of Improved Storage Efficiency with Pure Storage,” 37% of survey respondents named the cost of on-premises storage infrastructure as one area in which they had the greatest opportunity to significantly streamline or reduce costs.
Storage efficiency—fitting more data into less raw flash—is a key contributor to reducing the amount of physical storage that you must purchase, deploy, power, and cool. Technologies like deduplication, compression, and thin provisioning help to provide greater storage efficiency.
Figure 2. How storage is sized affects its cost of acquisition
Storage Efficiency Basics
When you need a certain amount of storage, you don’t necessarily go out and buy that exact amount, whether flash or disk. The amount of storage that you need is called effective capacity. In the flash world, most arrays work backward from that effective capacity number to identify how much actual (or raw) flash is needed. The basic formula is this: raw capacity (the total storage on the flash itself), less any system overhead (the space needed for system software) that equals usable capacity. That usable storage amount is then multiplied by an expected data-reduction ratio to predict the total effective capacity as shown in Figure 2.
The higher the data-reduction ratio, the more effective capacity you get from the raw flash. So, if one vendor has a ratio of 2:1 and another has 3:1, you can get all the effective capacity you need with less flash by choosing the storage that has better efficiency—thus lowering your acquisition costs.
The data-reduction ratio is a key factor: It drives efficiency and potentially lowers initial acquisition costs. Pure’s multi-stage, always-on deduplication and compression technologies drive the higher data-reduction ratios that Pure achieves relative to legacy vendors. And as ESG found, Pure can deliver up to 2.6x better efficiency—and therefore much lower acquisition costs—for the same capacity.
And Pure stands behind its data reduction technologies with our Right-Size Guarantee. If your FlashArray does not deliver on the promised effective capacity as you migrate your data over the six-month period of the guarantee, we’ll make it right. This includes providing free additional flash, as-needed, to meet the written guarantee. And, we’ll do it non-disruptively. With the Right-Size Guarantee, you get the storage you need without ever having to worry about buying an undersized (or oversized) array, even as you control costs.
Figure 3. Overall storage costs should include total cost of ownership (TCO) as well
Overall TCO Delivers the Best Storage Value
ESG also found that storage systems that also provide higher levels of performance—as well as easier administration, deployment, and maintenance—provide the greatest overall value at the lowest possible cost. This is an area where Pure really shines.
To get into the details, ESG looked at TCO per effective capacity for three industries: financial services, healthcare, and government. ESG surveyed 525 highly qualified storage practitioners and decision-makers who were very familiar with their organization’s on-premises storage infrastructure. They leveraged the survey data to create a TCO/ROI model that compared the costs and benefits of deploying, managing, and supporting storage capacity over a three-year period, including administration, maintenance, support, power, cooling, and floorspace costs ( Figure 3).
The results show that Pure saved financial services organizations up to 59% in TCO, and healthcare and government up to 62% (Figure 1).
What It Means to You
As ESG found, with Pure Storage systems:
- Financial services storage admins can affect the bottom line with mission-critical storage performance, availability, scalability, and agility—providing the potential to both grow revenue streams and lower costs.
- Healthcare storage administrators can spend less time dealing with capacity issues and more time providing first-rate services and reducing risk.
- Federal, state, local, and education admins can help get the most from their storage investments while modernizing their data centers and delivering quality service.
Download ESG’s full Economic Value Validation report.
Want more information on Evergreen Storage™, Pure FlashArray™, and the Right-Size Guarantee? Check out the Evergreen Storage page and download the IDC white paper on Evergreen.
