Coho Data Leverages Containers to Redefine Enterprise Storage

Coho Data, Inc. announced integration of Docker containers and microservice orchestration support to allow third-party applications to run directly within its customers’ enterprise storage systems.

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This container-converged storage system turns traditional enterprise storage into a fully integrated data platform that adapts to efficiently fit the rapidly changing needs of today’s enterprise environments.

Container convergence is bridge between old and new IT
With the emergence of containers as a development and deployment platform, enterprise IT administrators are quickly realizing the technology’s potential to support internal development teams that demand fast cycle times and a wide range of new infrastructure features.

Company’s strategy and vision aim to bring this emerging trend to what is traditionally perceived as a standard storage platform. Coho provides the ability to run containers directly on the storage nodes and leverages Google’s Kubernetes interfaces for configuring and deploying microservices. This allows customers to run data-centric services and applications directly adjacent to stored data.

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According to Ashish Nadkarni, research director, IDC, “Coho Data has taken the lead in ushering in ‘warpconvergence’ – the ability to run containers right on the storage arrays. By leveraging Kubernetes for orchestration and provisioning, Coho Data is also seeking to standardize ‘warpconvergence’ beyond the container standard – which is right now a missing feature in hyperconverged platforms.“

For more details refer to the IDC Insight paper (IDC #255947, May 2015) titled Warpconvergence’ – Coho Data Ushers in the Next Phase in Converged Infrastructure ($1,500)

This platform offers benefits to both new and existing customers, such as:

Datacenter consolidation. Using containers allows workloads to be run where the data resides.
Application portability. Enabling containers, as well as an internally hosted Docker registry, opens up a wide catalog of applications that can be hosted within the single storage platform and allows for a community of contributors to extend and evolve Coho’s data platform.
End-to-end agility and reliability. Full container integration within the storage system enables faster, seamless provisioning; managing of compute and storage resources as a whole; and combining the speed and flexibility of containers with both network integration and enterprise data services.

These benefits further company’s mission of delivering storage that is ‘Fast, Flexible, Forever.’

Example Use Cases:

Data analytics: Containers change the way Hadoop, Splunk or any data-intensive analysis tasks are deployed. Rather than moving data to a separate physical silo, it is fast and easy to spin up task instances directly within company’s arrays. Splunk computational container nodes on Coho can be done in a split second without the overhead of setting up an additional, external splunk cluster.
Development platform: Coho provides an platform for developers to collaborate on their various development workflows without the need for additional storage infrastructure.
Data protection: Containers provide an opportunity to incorporate third-party logic for enhanced data protection including backup agents, malware scanners and e-discovery and audit tools directly within the platform.

“Container convergence marks the end of enterprise storage being viewed as a closet, where data is packed away inside cardboard boxes,” said Andrew Warfield, CTO and co-founder, Coho Data. “This exciting evolution of our platform allows data to become active, easily supporting the addition of new protocols and directly integrating with customer workflows.“

Read technical blog: Active Data, Not Passive Storage

Demo of company’s platform that leverages Docker to improve enterprise storage extensibility at VMworld 2015.

Attend company’s VMworld session on this topic on Tuesday, Sept. 1: Containers, VMs and Microservices Walk into a Bar…