14 DAY TRIAL // Western Digital Continues to be one of the two greatest suppliers of HDDs, but it needs to keep improving and expanding if it is to stay in the game, which is precisely what it has just done.
Western Digital didn't come up with all its ideas and technologies. Some of them were added to its portfolio through the acquisition of other companies.
One such acquisition has just been announced: Western Digital has bought Arkeia Software, Inc., a private company specializing in data protection.
Most of Arkeia's products are software-based, but there are also some physical appliances in its collection of assets.
More importantly, the buyout has been marked by the release of the Arkeia Network Backup version 10.0 software, which allows administrators to combine physical media and Internet transport with the goal of replicating backup sets to or from remote cloud storage.
Indeed, cloud backup and general storage is more widely used than ever. Certainly, most customers still rely on their own mainframes and such, but the idea of letting someone else deal with the issue of data storage and backup is gaining Steam.
Arkeia's software allows large backup sets to be moved on physical media, and smaller sets to be sent over the web to whatever destination is selected.
It is even possible, convenient actually, to replicate backup sets from a local area network to cloud storage, without having to use miles of magnetic tape for it. Arkeia calls this Progressive Deduplication.
The financial aspects of the deal haven't been disclosed.
"Arkeia's products expand WD's growing product portfolio of solutions for small- and medium-sized businesses," said Jim Welsh , executive vice president and general manager of WD's Branded and CE products.
"SMB organizations are managing ever-growing volumes of critical business data, which need to be stored, shared and secured. Our easy-to-manage small storage server, WD Sentinel DX4000, provides backup and storage centralization capabilities for small businesses and workgroups, while Arkeia's network backup software provides a more feature-rich data-protection solution for larger SMB customers."