Data has become the currency of the new economy and the ability to extract value from data is the ultimate competitive edge.
That's according to HGST president, Mike Cordano, following a Western Digital survey of CIOs and IT decision makers which highlighted storage and data management as a critical factor to success.
The survey found 86 per cent of CIOs and IT decision makers surveyed believe that all data generated has value if the organisation is able to store, access and analyse it optimally.
However, less than half (48 per cent) of those surveyed admitted they were not storing all available data.
The results also show a growing trend toward adoption of analytic tools and storage, and highlights Active Archive and Cloud as burgeoning market opportunities.
The report also found 78 per of respondents believed better analytic tools and storage solutions would improve business efficiency, while 22 per cent admitted they did not have the right mix of structured, unstructured and semi-structured data storage to analyse their data
It found 56 per cent were planning, or already implementing Active Archive solutions and that 61 per cent were planning or engaged in a total cost of ownership (TCO) related project, the highest level for any initiative tested.
There is also a gap between the amount of data being produced and the ability for companies to store that data.
While 78 per cent of those surveyed contend that access to better analytic tools and storage solutions would improve business efficiency, 25 per cent admit their organisation does not have the right mix of structured, unstructured and semi-structured data storage to optimally analyse what data they do have.
It is not surprising, then, that respondents cited storage as the primary driver of IT investment, especially in China (77 per cent), France (67 per cent), Germany (66 per cent), and the US and Korea (tied at 62 per cent).
Data security and governance were cited as the largest concern when it comes to data for respondents (35 per cent), and those polled pointed to long-term storage (93 per cent) and data protection (96 per cent) as drivers of innovation and investment to address these issues.
Cordano said smart organisations were harnessing the power of data to gain understanding, drive predictions and offer new insights.
"The challenges of storing, retaining, accessing and transforming this massive volume of data has put storage at the heart of the datacentre,” he said.
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Survey respondents are working hard to extract extra business value from stored data.
Active Archive, a sub-segment of the Cold Storage category, is emerging to address the changing dynamics as data archiving is no longer limited to offline storage with the mindset of “write once” and likely “read never.”
The findings uncovered that 56 per cent of those surveyed said their companies were planning, or already implementing Active Archive solutions to address longer-term storage needs, with adoption the highest in China (83 per cent).
When analysed by the size of the enterprise, four of every 10 (40 per cent) of the largest companies (5000+ employees) have Active Archive projects in progress while mid-sized enterprises are the largest segment beginning to plan (65 per cent).
The report found investments in SSDs and total cost of ownership (TCO) initiatives were thriving.
Today, a majority of IT decision makers surveyed (63 per cent) are investing in SSDs to accelerate or extend the life of hardware investments, especially in China (84 per cent), Germany (75 per cent) and France (72 per cent).
The survey found that application acceleration software is commonly used to increase performance at larger firms (63 per cent), but still not used widely in small and mid-sized companies (49 per cent).
Among all respondents, scalability (89 per cent) and application acceleration (86 per cent) were cited among the top four drivers of innovation in data storage.
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Data accessibility is also a growing concern, and Cloud storage was identified as the top discipline for active investment. Public Cloud storage growth is expected to quadruple in the next year.
Today, only seven per cent of the respondents keep more than 50 per cent of their data in the cloud, however, 30 per cent expect to keep at least 50 per cent of their data in the cloud a year from now.
The online survey, commissioned by HGST and hosted on the Springboard Network, surveyed 710 senior information technology decision makers in China, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, the UK and the US between July and August.
