Originating Author: Dave Vellante
In a conference call with analysts this past week, IBM executives credibly positioned the new Grid Access Manager as a formidable offering within the medical imaging space. Notable is the product's innovative software-based storage management approach that offers great potential to address large customer records retention challenges in the highly regulated medical environment.
We see this announcement as lending credibility to software-led storage architectures and in particular the Extensible Access Method. As well, we see the possibility that the soluton could be applied to other areas such as homeland security and possibly spatial applications. However, users should be very careful and not expect this solution to be extended broadly to other industries and applications as IBM is likely to move slowly due to the complexities of generalizing this solution.
Action Item: While this announcement does signify further momentum for software-led 'spread everything' storage architectures, users should take a wait-and-see posture in regards to IBM extending the Grid Access Manager beyond the medical and other highly scrutized industries that manage relatively predictable data types. Only leading edge customers with sizable business problems will benefit from this solution in the near term.
Action Item:
Footnotes:
