The Numbers Game
AI/ML applications also put huge demands on storage system performance. Processing these massive unstructured datasets requires extremely low latencies and high performance, and enterprises require consistency, no matter the scale and output.
Legacy disk-based storage systems, which are based on serial hard drives, simply can no longer keep up to meet these consistency and performance requirements. The result has been growth in all flash file and object storage. Growth will only accelerate in the next 5 years as the price of flash decreases and as new architectures use memory technologies such as Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) and Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) that enable ultra-low latency distributed storage architectures.
Further, it’s important to remember that all of this data doesn’t live in one place. Data is generated outside the data center, whether by applications or objects such as physical cameras, and then is moved elsewhere to be processed. This can happen in a public cloud, a private data center, or, more likely, a combination of both. Therefore, the management of this data across its lifecycle as it moves from one place to the next has become a chief consideration. Storage solutions must be flexible and have the ability to operate in the cloud or on-prem to meet these requirements.
Building for a Better Future
Most of the world’s unstructured data is stored on systems that were designed more than 20 years ago. These systems were created at a time when the notion of trillions of files and objects and exabytes of data to be stored for decades was not on the horizon. These systems simply were not designed with this amount and type of data in mind and weren’t built to scale to this degree.
Most businesses are adopting initiatives based around AI, ML, or deep learning to keep innovating. It’s critical that they have a storage solution in place to keep pace with the data requirements for these types of initiatives and are flexible enough to grow and change as needs and technology change.
Data growth is something that should be celebrated as we move forward. As AI/ML grows in popularity and ubiquity, it only serves to improve our lives in every way. Having the right storage solution in place in anticipation of this continued growth will benefit not only the enterprises managing this data, but ultimately, their customers as well.