Alletra Storage MP Puts HPE ‘Far Ahead’ Of Competitors In Hybrid Cloud Storage Management Battle

“From my point of view HPE is far ahead of the competition in what we call hybrid (cloud storage) management” with the HPE GreenLake pay per use cloud platform, said Edgemo Infrastructure Specialist Niels Vejrup Pedersen.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s new Alletra Storage MP system puts the company “far ahead” of competitors in the hybrid cloud storage management battle, HPE partners told CRN.

“From my point of view HPE is far ahead of the competition in what we call hybrid (cloud storage) management” with the HPE GreenLake pay per use cloud platform, said Niels Vejrup Pedersen, datacenter lead and infrastructure specialist for Edgemo, the largest HPE storage partner in Denmark, reacting to the new HPE Alletra Storage MP launch. “This is a game-changer for enterprise storage,” he said.

The “innovative” Alletra Storage MP has out of the gate become the “number one product in our offerings,” said Pedersen. He said the Alletra Storage MP launch comes with more customers looking at doing hybrid storage management from the cloud.

Customers used to managing storage on-premise are seeing the benefits of getting rid of local storage management appliances that need to be updated and secured, said Pedersen. Putting storage management in the cloud is the “future,” he said.

HPE, for its part, repeated that sentiment, calling the Alletra Storage MP system launch, along with a new file storage offering and an expanded block storage service for its HPE GreenLake pay per use platform “the future of storage.”

[RELATED: The ‘Future Of Storage:’ HPE Unleashes GreenLake File, Block Storage With Alletra Storage MP]

The new HPE Alletra Storage MP platform, a modular file and block storage system, is a “huge step forward” that simplifies data management with “intuitive cloud operations, helping customers store, manage and protect all workloads everywhere,” said HPE Senior Vice President and General Manager of Cloud and Data Infrastructure Platforms Patrick Osborne.

Pedersen, for his part, said the new Alletra Storage MP pricing is aggressive with enterprise capabilities that are targeted at the “sweet spot” of the market. “It has the features of the bigger product which is very, very cool,” he said. “We have some unique, innovative features in how it scales, how it is built. That is very different from the storage systems we know today.”

The Alletra Storage MP is “radical” change in how customers think about storage, said Pedersen. “Now we are talking management from the cloud integrated with the GreenLake cloud platform, which is the central management for everything HPE. The radical change is HPE has built a different platform that is way more flexible. We are going to see much more functionality coming to this platform.”

Alletra Storage MP combined with GreenLake has provided a breakthrough “single pane of glass” management and procurement platform for hybrid cloud storage, said Steve Hinns, account Director and head of HPE Solutions for Nexstor, a United Kingdom HPE partner.

“That has not been done in the industry,” said Hinns. “You have cloud portals that you can monitor. You have cloud platforms that are procurement or management. But you don’t have the whole thing wrapped in one platform or one solution.”

Hinns said the Alletra Storage MP with GreenLake provides a “consistent experience” in how various IT stakeholders consume IT.

Hinns praised HPE as a “valued partner” that has continued over many years to deliver breakthrough IT innovation aimed at meeting the “challenges” faced by customers. “HPE GreenLake as a platform is revolutionary, it is the next step forward,” he said.

In fact, he said, HPE GreenLake is destined to see customers through the challenges they face over the next decade. “It’s before its time,” he said. “That is the great thing for us as partners is being able to talk to customers about what’s new, what’s fresh and how can we improve their way of working.”

HPE GreenLake’s pay per use model has provided customers “more bang for their buck,” said Hinns. “That consumption model is really attractive because they are not having to buy more than they need,” he said. “They buy exactly what they need, they have a fixed price and they scale as they need, when they need.”

That GreenLake pay per use model has opened the door for Nexstor to match its service and support solutions wrapped into a “simple monthly cost,” said Hinns. “It allows us to focus on what the customer needs from us,” he said.

“I’m incredibly excited about these new offerings because it gives me the chance to bring something new to customers,” he said. “HPE allows us to get into that conversation, it allows us to be relevant and current to today’s challenges.”