Exablox Emerged From Stealth

Exablox Corp. tears down obstacles to unstructured data deployments with OneBlox with OneSystem.

OneBlox is a scale-out object-based appliance that is accessible with Server Message Block (SMB) and CIFS network protocols for organizations of all sizes. Now, companies can utilize this affordable cloud-managed solution with enterprise features, including inline deduplication, CDP, and zero-configuration storage expansion.

Patent pending architecture solves businesses’ common storage pain points: complicated installation, cumbersome storage management, lack of data security and forklift upgrades. Without the shackles of a legacy storage architecture, Exablox’s clean-sheet approach combines the OneBlox appliance with OneSystem, a multi-tenant cloud-based management service.

This solution is:

• Powerful: The scale-out object-based file system enables non-disruptive capacity and performance expansion with zero configuration. Additionally, its inline deduplication for primary storage and disk-based backup maximizes storage utilization;
• Simple: The secure multi-tenant cloud-based management service enables organizations and MSPs to manage storage deployments with minimal effort from anywhere with an Internet connection, and eliminates on-premises software requirements; and
• Protected: The always-on CDP capability enables fine-grained data recovery. Its real-time replication enables DR, and its inline encryption prevents data theft from any removed disk drive.

No RAID. No LUNS. No Volumes. No Hassle.
OneBlox can provide protected CIFS/SMB shares to users in less than five minutes with zero configuration. With no impact to business operations, additional OneBlox appliances can be added automatically, enabling resource constrained organizations to scale file system capacity without downtime. Organizations can forego forklift upgrades and multiple disk-based targets as their business grows with OneBlox’s dynamic scalability.

The company enables organizations to choose their own SATA or SAS drives and provides the flexibility to mix and match drive technologies and capacities. In doing so, organizations begin with exactly the desired capacity, and can add any new drive at any time, with zero configuration changes. This just in time storage capacity is dynamically pooled within the global file system. Combined with OneBlox’s inline deduplication for primary and disk-based backup and recovery storage, waste is minimized and organizations are able to maximize storage utilization.

According to Gartner, "The rapid growth in unstructured data, which is growing at 60% to 80% year-over-year, and the need to store and retrieve it in a cost-effective, automated manner will drive the growth of object storage."

Multi-tenant cloud-based Management Service
Utilizing the latest cloud-based technologies, OneSystem eliminates the requirement of on site management software, configuration and ongoing maintenance. It streamlines storage management enabling organizations and MSPs the ability to proactively manage and monitor all of the storage resources across companies and geographies, from a single browser.

Data Protection and Recovery
Patent pending CDP technology enables users to recover business information, including the very last file changes, directly from Windows, Mac or Linux–minimizing disruption and loss of productivity. Additionally, all snapshots enjoy the same deduplication benefit as primary storage, maximizing storage utilization.

Application data can become corrupted, files can be accidentally deleted, and site failures can occur. OneBlox’s real-time replication protects against local and remote failures with a global file system replicated across multiple locations, ensuring when a site failure does occur, business disruption is minimized.

By default, all information written to OneBlox is automatically encrypted with AES-256.

"As a museum, we consume very large quantities of storage capacity for our digital assets, much of it in the form of unwieldy unstructured data. As this information is often a digital replica of museum assets that may be more than a century old, data protection is a top priority for us. We found our increasing ‚’appetite’ for storage became too large for our legacy storage systems that required regular and costly upgrades, including data migrations. With OneBlox, we plan to dynamically scale our storage needs over time, spend less time managing storage, and access subsets of our information with greater ease than our current and complicated storage tiering/archiving solution. With OneBlox’s CDP and replication capabilities, it’s potentially another welcomed level of assurance that the museum’s assets are protected. The OneBlox is also cost effective, a critical factor for non-profit organizations such as ourselves," said Marc Check, director of information and interactive technology, Museum of Science, Boston.

"Our customers depend on us to keep their critical data protected, available and secure. They can’t afford downtime or unplanned interruptions, and that means we can’t afford them either. OneBlox’s cloud-based management and scale-out storage architecture allows us to seamlessly move and grow storage capabilities exactly when and where our customers need them most. And with OneBlox’s built-in enterprise functionality, we can meet customers’ every storage need from one vendor, which makes doing business simpler and delivers more value," said Steve Neverve, president and CEO of Nevtec, Inc., an IT MSP and data protection company.

"If storage admins try to solve the challenges associated with managing unstructured data with the same technology they’ve been using, insanity may certainly be in their future because things just won’t get better. Vendors like Exablox are out there with innovative technology that is designed for the unstructured data challenges IT faces today, not the challenges faced 20 or 30 years ago," said Terri McClure, senior analyst of Enterprise Strategy Group

"We spent the last two years working with customers and partners to build a next-generation storage solution that addresses the pain points they’re confronting as they deal with the explosion of unstructured data. We’re tearing down the technology barriers that have forced customers into choosing between the features they need and the solutions they can afford. At Exablox, we think every customer should feel their storage is safe and scalable," said Douglas Brockett, CEO of Exablox

Pricing and Availability
OneBlox is available to select businesses with pricing beginning at under $10,000 for a 32TB solution and under $40,000 for a replicated four-node 64TB DR solution. OneBlox will be available in the 1H 2013 and sold through authorized partners.

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