Hitachi Vantara Unveils Industry Leading AI Operations Software and New Flash Storage Systems

Hitachi Vantara Unveils
Industry Leading AI Operations Software and New Flash Storage Systems

New Systems with
Predictive Analytics and IT Automation Software Deliver Agile Data
Infrastructure and Intelligent Operations to Fuel Data Center Modernization
Initiatives

SINGAPORE
– May 10, 2018 – Hitachi Vantara, a wholly owned subsidiary of
Hitachi, Ltd. (TSE: 6501), today introduced new innovations to drive data
center modernization. Hitachi unveiled new high-performance storage systems in
the industry’s only storage family with a 100% data availability guarantee, and
integrated, and cross-platform AI-powered analytics and IT automation software.
The all-new, all-flash and hybrid Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP)
systems and AI operations software give customers unprecedented agility and
automation to reduce costs and increase operational efficiencies—the foundation
for any modern data center initiative. Developers will gain increased
flexibility and can now run more workloads in a single system through Docker
and Redhat Openshift container integration with Swarm and Kubernetes
orchestration.

>> View the Hitachi Vantara Data
Center Modernization video with Bob Madaio, vice president, infrastructure
solutions marketing at Hitachi Vantara <<

“As artificial intelligence and machine-learning
technologies mature, enterprise storage vendors have an opportunity to provide
considerable assistance to customers on their journey to autonomous
operations,” said Eric Burgener, research vice president of Storage at
IDC. “Vendors like Hitachi Vantara, with their enhanced AI operations
portfolio, are leveraging AI/ML to simplify infrastructure management while
improving platform reliability, infrastructure efficiency and the ability to
meet service level agreements.”

Intelligent Operations

As data center operations become more complex,
operational efficiencies can deteriorate and the risks of downtime or data loss
increase. Hitachi Vantara is introducing the industry’s most advanced AI
operations software portfolio, which includes Hitachi
Infrastructure Analytics Advisor,Hitachi Automation
Director and Hitachi Data
Instance Director to deliver a
more agile data infrastructure.

Hitachi Infrastructure Analytics
Advisor (HIAA) delivers an AI-powered “brain” to provide deeper data center
insights by looking across the data path, including virtual machines, servers,
networks and storage. HIAA uses machine learning to more efficiently optimize, troubleshoot
and predict data center needs. New HIAA capabilities include: 

·  Predictive analytics: AI mines telemetry data to
predict when new storage purchases will be required, improving budget planning
and helping to prevent performance dips. Machine learning analyzes all
resources associated with storage to help ensure the right resource is
purchased.

·  4x faster root-cause analysis: A patented
AI engine analyzes telemetry data and configuration changes across the data
path to isolate issues and uses a new heuristic engine to recommend resolution.
Integration with Hitachi Automation Director allows immediate fixes based on
best practices.

Hitachi Automation Director (HAD) software provides an
“engine” for orchestrating the delivery and management of IT resources so that
teams can focus on innovation. A highly customizable solution, HAD
automates core IT service delivery routines including virtual machine, network
zoning and storage and data protection tasks to reduce errors that impact
uptime, customer experiences and return on investment (ROI). HAD has been
enhanced to:

·  Integrate with IT service management (ITSM)
tools, including the ServiceNow® platform, for improved tracking and control of
IT resource delivery.

·  Improve REST API integration for provisioning of
third-party resources, including storage.

·  Take commands from HIAA for issue remediation
and storage configuration data.

·  Automate the setup of Hitachi Data Instance
Director (HDID) data protection to safeguard against data loss or
downtime. 

The new integrations between HIAA, HAD and HDID are
part of Hitachi’s growing AI operations initiative to help customers begin the
journey to autonomous operations. These offerings are now available both
independently and packaged together with Hitachi VSP to help customers easily
get the tools that drive data center modernization.

“VMware and Hitachi are working together to bring a
new operational model to the data center,” said Lee Caswell, vice
president, Product, Storage and Availability Business Unit, VMware. “Our
joint integration work helps Hitachi VSP customers seamlessly leverage many
VMware solutions including VMware vSphere, Virtual Volumes and Site Recovery
Manager to simplify daily operations and disaster recovery scenarios. And by
sharing telemetry data between Hitachi AI operations software and
vCenter-native management tools, we help customers digitally transform their
business and realize the power of modern infrastructure.” 

Agile Data Infrastructure

Data center modernization begins with a rock-solid
foundation for consistent delivery of data at high speed and low latency, with
support for diverse workload requirements and multi-cloud integration.
Hitachi’s new all-flash VSP F series and
hybrid-flash VSP G series systems
support an agile data infrastructure with the industry’s only 100% data
availability guarantee and up to 3x more IOPS performance and 2.5x greater
scalability compared to prior VSP models. This means customers can expect
faster analytics processing and application performance – fueling a faster
return on data. Cloud and container integration allow more workloads to run on
a single system, while helping to eliminate data silos and support new
workloads.

The new enterprise-class Hitachi VSP models include
the all-flash VSP F700 and VSP F900 and the hybrid flash VSP G700 and G900
systems. To reach a broader range of customers, Hitachi is introducing new
midrange models. They include the VSP F350, F370, G350 and G370 systems. The
systems are powered by the next generation of Hitachi Storage Virtualization
Operating System, SVOS RF, which has been re-architected for
increased performance, scalability and data efficiency. All new VSP systems are
backed by Hitachi’s new flat service model and come with a Foundation software
package that includes Hitachi’s proven infrastructure analytics and copy data
management software. All new Hitachi VSP systems are available now.

The new systems have significant improvements compared
to prior VSP models:

·  Performance scalability: Scaling to more than
2.4M IOPS and 41GB/s of bandwidth.

·  More efficiency: Up to 70% more IOPS per core
for increased price/performance

·  Greater consolidation: 8x more volumes and one
million snapshots per system

·  Improved data efficiency: Up to 3.4x faster
deduplication and 5x faster SVOS-based compression.

“Hitachi is helping the world’s business and IT
leaders respond to modern data challenges by leveraging predictive
analytics and automation as part of their larger data management and
digital transformation initiatives,” said Iri Trashanski, senior vice
president, Infrastructure and Edge Products at Hitachi Vantara. “With the
criticality of data in our customers’ environments, there is no room for
good-enough storage technology or data-silos created by weak infrastructure.
The technology announced today will help create the agile data infrastructure
and intelligent operations our customers need to drive transformation.”

About Hitachi Vantara

Hitachi Vantara, a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd., helps data-driven
leaders find and use the value in their data to innovate intelligently and
reach outcomes that matter for business and society. We combine technology,
intellectual property and industry knowledge to deliver data-managing solutions
that help enterprises improve their customers’ experiences, develop new revenue
streams, and lower the costs of business. Only Hitachi Vantara elevates your
innovation advantage by combining deep information technology (IT), operational
technology (OT) and domain expertise. We work with organizations everywhere to
drive data to meaningful outcomes. Visit us at www.hitachivantara.com.

Connect with Hitachi Vantara

About Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi, Ltd. (TSE: 6501), headquartered in Tokyo,
Japan, delivers innovations that answer society’s challenges, combining its
operational technology, information technology, and products/systems. The
company’s consolidated revenues for fiscal 2017 (ended March 31, 2018) totaled
9,368.6 billion yen ($88.4 billion). The Hitachi Group is an innovation partner
for the IoT era, and it has approximately 307,000 employees worldwide. Through
collaborative creation with customers, Hitachi is deploying Social Innovation
Business using digital technologies in a broad range of sectors, including
Power/Energy, Industry/Distribution/Water, Urban Development, and Finance/Social
Infrastructure/Healthcare. For more information on Hitachi, please visit the
company’s website at http://www.hitachi.com.