IBM Edge2013 is in full swing at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Wikibon Senior Analyst Stu Miniman is in attendance, dropping in on this morning’s Live NewsDesk Show to detail the sentiment at this year’s event.  Flash storage takes the cake for buzzworthy topics at IBM Edge, but the question is whether or not Big Blue’s too late entering this market.  EMC and other have been investing in flash since 2008.

Though lately, Miniman emphasizes, IBM has been sending the right message in supporting flash — this technology is radically changing the entire role of software in the data center.  IBM now offers a flash-solid portfolio, and we expect more flash-first products from IBM.

But what’s intriguing is IBM General Manager Ambuj Goyal stating that the term storage is antiquated and that the industry should focus on data and results.

“It’s a bit humorous,” Miniman stated.  “Storage is about data.  It’s about information and that’s where Ambuj is going.  It’s not about where we have a repository for information or archives.  It’s really about how we get utilization and results out of what we’ve done and that was a big thing.

“Of course, what I poke at a little bit is IBM bas been kind of an afterthought in the storage market competitively for the last few years so it helps to try to reinvent that definition and therefore you can position yourself better.  IBM is a huge company with lots of software assets, and they are very big in the services industry.  They’re trying to hit these new waves of innovation and disruption that are coming into the data, the storage market to become more relevant.”

Miniman also notes that open source is critical for IBM’s strategy stating that the company not only talks about open source but commits resources to it.  Big Blue is well experienced in open source and has good software and good services that brings the whole solution together.

As Randy Arsenault, Platform Strategy Consultant at IBM, pointed out, “no single vendor is in the position to provide everything the industry demands on their own.” There is not going by one such vendor able to provide “the robust set of services needed by the industry.” Collaborative approaches are needed to evolve. “We are going to see a lot of acceleration toward the more open, more industry-lead evolution.”

For more of Miniman’s Breaking Analysis on IBM’s storage strategy, check out the NewsDesk video below: