Friday, 21 October 2005 14:46 EST

Cost Still A Priority, But Solutions Rather Than Tactical Fixes Dominate Decision Making According To Storage Expo Visitors

Stoke Poges, Bucks, UK – 21st October 2005 – Solutions rather than individual technologies are driving storage investments, according to a survey conducted by Hitachi Data Systems at London’s Storage Expo.

Canvassing the views of 206 visitors to the Hitachi booth, the survey reveals that while cost is still a primary driver for storage sales, having best of breed technology and an end-to-end solution are equally as important considerations for investment.

“Customers are facing a multitude of business challenges regarding how they store and retrieve data,” explains Brian Moroney, UK Managing Director at Hitachi Data Systems. “According to our survey, they’re looking for vendors with solutions that not only solve critical issues such as compliance and business continuity, but also drive business efficiencies in the face of an ever growing burden of data.”

While cost will always be a major factor – out of six options, 37% of respondents listed it as their number one consideration for storage purchasing decisions – having best of breed technology and implementing an end-to-end solution were a close second and third (32% and 25% respectively).

According to Moroney, this suggests that initial cap-ex spend is becoming less of a concern as customers look to align their storage investments with overall business performance, reducing long term costs by eliminating storage inefficiencies.

With vendors differentiating themselves on their ability to deliver against a wide range of business issues – rather than simply the cost of a terabyte of storage – customers are broadening their selection criteria to encompass areas such as industry specific solutions and complete vendor solutions versus composite offerings.

“Five years ago, cost would have been a clear leader, as companies countered their growing data payload by simply adding extra terabytes. With five years of flat budgets against an ever growing data burden, the focus has shifted from containment to management, an emphasis which is borne out in this research.”

When quizzed on what factors were driving storage investment, increasing data was, unsurprisingly, ranked highest out of six options (polling 40%). However, business continuity (26%), legislation (16%) and improving business performance (12%) came second, third and fourth – reflecting the shift to solutions rather than boxes of capacity.

Replacing outdated technology was the last placed driver for storage investment (3%) suggesting there is clear market demand for virtualisation technologies that improve the efficiency of storage systems while utilising existing devices. This is supported by the results on what respondents understood by the term virtualisation: - with 75% of the sample picking out technology that…“allows the interoperability of different storage platforms” (39%) and “improves storage utilisation” (36%). Only 2% of respondents did not understand the term virtualisation.

Concludes Moroney: “It is no longer advisable for companies to solely buy hardware and capacity as a way to manage the exponential growth of data. It is encouraging that the majority of customers at Storage Expo understand virtualisation solutions are a way of efficiently dealing with the data burden. While the survey’s methodology was far from scientific, it does provide an accurate flavour of the issues that were prevalent at the show as well as providing insight into the current customer mindset.”

About Hitachi Data Systems

Hitachi Data Systems leverages global R&D resources to develop storage solutions built on industry-leading technology with the performance, availability and scalability to maximise customers' ROI and minimise their risk. By focusing on the customer's perspective as we apply the best hardware, software, and services from Hitachi and our partners, we uniquely satisfy our customers' business needs.

With 2,900 employees, Hitachi Data Systems conducts business through direct and indirect channels in the public, government and private sectors in over 170 countries and regions. Its customers include more than 50 percent of FORTUNE 100 companies. For more information, please visit our Web site at www.hds.com.

About Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi, Ltd., (NYSE: HIT), headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is a leading global electronics company with approximately 347,000 employees worldwide. Fiscal 2004 (ended March 31, 2005) consolidated sales totaled 9,027.0 billion yen ($84.4 billion). The company offers a wide range of systems, products and services in market sectors including information systems, electronic devices, power and industrial systems, consumer products, materials and financial services. For more information on Hitachi, please visit the company’s Website at http://www.hitachi.com