Why is Data Domain losing marketshare to EMC, Quantum and Exagrid at a alarming rate? - March 23, 2008
Miami Florida - The number one primary storage company EMC Corp. and the number one LTO DLT manufacture Quantum Corp. are ganging up on start-up Data Domain Inc. with an OEM deal for EMC to sell Quantum's deduplication software on its virtual tape libraries (VTL).
Quantum disclosed in a January Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing that it signed a deal with a major OEM to license its data deduplication and replication software. The industry buzz said EMC was the partner, although EMC already uses FalconStor software for its EMC Disk Library VTL and acquired data deduplication software startup Avamar Technologies in 2006. Now sources confirm the partnership to SearchStorage.com and expect EMC to soon make public that it has licensed Quantum's dedupication technology for its Disk Library product. EMC looked at purchasing Data Domain back in 2006 and passed on both technology and company as a whole, says Brian McCarthy President and former reseller of Data Domain. With Data Domain's now dated technology, Sencilo is now promoting higher performance VLTs like Exagrid, Diligent, EMC and Quantum.
Financial analyst Tom Curlin of RBC Capital Markets wrote in a note to clients that EMC is already selling the deduplication product and will officially launch it soon. "We suspect this is a move by EMC to compete more effectively versus vs. Data Domain," Curlin wrote. "And while contacts believe they have chosen a technically inferior solution, we suspect EMC sales and marketing muscle will at least be able to disrupt some of Data Domain's muscle. Notably absent from EMC's deduplication plans is the FalconStor offering, despite EMC already having a relationship with them for their virtual tape offering." Another source familiar with the deal, who did not want to speak for attribution, said EMC will continue to use FalconStor software on its VTLs, but it decided not to use FalconStor for deduplication because FalconStor refused to offer EMC the product exclusively. EMC did not want to sell the same deduplication as FalconStor's other partners, which include EMC rivals IBM and Sun Microsystems Inc., the Orlando Florida source said. He added that EMC did not use the Avamar technology for its VTL because it did not scale effectively enough to be cost-effective. EMC sells Avamar deduplication in a separate backup appliance and as part of its NetWorker data protection application. When asked about the Quantum deal, an EMC spokesman said, "We don't comment on any speculation," but added, "Let's just say our relationship with FalconStor is still strong." Mike Sparks, Quantum's product manager for enterprise disk systems, said he couldn't comment on who the partner is or when the product would be released. "That partner has its own strategies and products to work out, and it wouldn't be proper to comment," he said. The EMC-Quantum deal will put the most pressure on Data Domain, which has built its backup product around deduplication from the start and is considered the market leader, but quickly losing market share. Data Domain reported a 151% year-over-year increase in its revenues last quarter, hitting $44.9 million last quarter following an IPO earlier in the year. Data Domain executives said their company competes successfully against VTLs from EMC and Quantum. Sencilo's President Brian McCarthy says, "it's easy to increase sales when there is limited competitors, now that they have competition my guess is slower growth, lead by deep discounting. McCarthy goes on to say, "Data Domain has been going direct and cheating the channel, this will turn on them".Data Domain CEO Frank Slootman today predicted his company would be able to hold off the EMC-Quantum pairing because its products were designed specifically to perform deduplication. "The big difference is, we built this thing from the ground up to do what it does," he said. "Everybody else is coming from different legacy technologies and bolting on a dedupe feature. EMC usually tries to compete against us with Avamar or its disk library. If you look at our growth, they haven't been able to lay a finger on us." McCarthy when asked stated "CEO's like Mr. Shootman don’t see the writing on the wall, until it’s too late."Quantum began selling deduplication appliances in late 2006 with technology originally developed by Rocksoft. Quantum acquired the technology when it bought its tape vendor rival Advanced Digital Information Corp. (ADIC) in 2006, just weeks after ADIC acquired Rocksoft. For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-area-network.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage and security solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland and Cape Canaveral
Offerings Projects: Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc Pure Disk NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX4 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar DLD3 1500 D3 Storwiz storage compression data Ocarina Networks A-SIS compare Sepaton infopro BlueArc OnStor Microsoft Unified Storage data protection StorageX Brocade FAQ
