At first glance, the recent announcement by IBM of updates for its Spectrum Storage portfolio appear to follow a traditional path for the tech giant. A partnership here, a performance increase there, an enhanced data recovery solution on top … pretty much what the enterprise world has come to expect.

Yet, a closer look at what IBM released offers fresh insight into several key elements that are driving the company’s overall hybrid cloud strategy. Behind the storage improvements can be found an aggressive game plan by IBM to build its presence in AIOps, strengthen its integration with the public cloud and leverage Red Hat Inc. assets to move the business forward.

It is a strategy that has been underway since Arvind Krishna assumed leadership of IBM in April 2020. The long-game for the company is not based on its traditional hardware base, but instead delivering software solutions to meet the needs of enterprises in a cloud native, application-driven world.

“Over the past 18 months or so, we’ve seen IBM focused on delivering a comprehensive application management stack,” said Moor Insights and Strategy analyst Steve McDowell, in an interview with SiliconANGLE for this story. “While IBM has some of the best storage hardware in the business, IBM’s storage story is really all about the software that enables the broader strategy. I think IBM is already laying its key cards out on the table. Arvind is very smart, and we’ve seen a steady cadence of moves that tell us exactly where IBM is going.”

Turbonomic brings AIOps

One of the key pieces in the IBM Storage announcement involved the integration of Turbonomic Inc. with IBM FlashSystem. The company acquired Turbonomic, an application resource and network management software provider, barely six months ago.

Turbonomic’s analysis engine will now combine FlashSystem, virtualization and application data to optimize array performance and automate certain actions, resulting in an up to 30% increase in storage density, according to IBM.

The Turbonomic acquisition was significant because it helped move IBM forward more quickly in the red-hot AIOps space. An OpsRamp Inc. survey found that 87% of respondents viewed AIOps tools as improving data-driven collaboration, and a Gartner Inc. study has predicted that AIOps usage will grow from 5% to 30% by 2023.

Turbonomic uses AI to provide full-stack observability and management. Its tools facilitate performance optimization and cost control across the IT infrastructure, key factors for many administrators as they grapple with an increasingly complex and expensive compute landscape.

“AIOps and intelligent manageability are becoming a critical capability, and Turbonomic addresses that need,” McDowell said. “AIOps is the future of IT administration. It is why IBM bought Turbonomic. This is IBM’s play, and it’s a good one.”

Public cloud alliances

Another intriguing part of IBM’s announcement involves the expansion of its Spectrum Storage software to Microsoft Azure. This follows a similar arrangement that IBM also provided with Spectrum Virtualize for Public Cloud on Amazon Web Services Inc.

Spectrum Virtualize was initially created 18 years ago to extract complexity from different storage vendors and offer a single presentation. The outreach to AWS and now Azure represents a clear recognition by IBM that enterprise IT wants to work with vendors that can support a hybrid model. Customers desire common storage capabilities in the cloud and datacenter to better implement disaster-recovery, DevOps and data-migration strategies, according to IBM’s Chris Saul, as part of the company’s storage announcement.

By forming alliances with AWS and Microsoft, IBM is essentially following the market, since the two hyperscalers collectively own more than 50% of the public cloud pie and Azure has been steadily growing its share. Could a deal with Google Cloud Platform be next in the execution of IBM’s storage strategy?

“I think IBM will eventually bring Spectrum Virtualize to GCP, but I don’t believe that it’s a priority for the company,” McDowell noted. “They’ll do it when there’s a compelling business case, such as an impactful customer request. Until then, they have a solution that services the bulk of the enterprise public cloud market, and they’ll likely prioritize their R&D spend in higher-value efforts.”

Capitalizing on OpenShift

One area where IBM is clearly focused on higher-value initiatives is within the Red Hat portfolio.

As part of its storage releases, IBM announced that Spectrum Protect Plus will now include data protection support in Red Hat OpenShift and Kubernetes. The latest enhancements for Spectrum Virtualize also facilitate deployment of OpenShift workloads on Azure and direct backup to Amazon S3 object store.

IBM’s focus on delivering a comprehensive application management solution has been centered around OpenShift. This makes sense because, from a financial perspective, Red Hat is making the company’s $34-billion purchase in 2018 look like a good deal.

Although IBM’s earnings announcement on Oct. 20 fell below revenue targets expected by analysts, the company noted that Red Hat grew 17% in the previous quarter and OpenShift experienced a rise in recurring revenue of more than 40%.

OpenShift has begun to play a noticeable role in a number of IBM’s strategic announcements over the past year. A newly announced extension of a partnership with Credit Mutuel included a combined OpenShift and IBM Z solution. The recent collaboration with Apptio Inc. capitalizes on OpenShift’s workload management capabilities. Company executives have indicated that a spin-off of IBM’s managed services infrastructure business – Kyndryl – will leverage the OpenShift cloud platform with deployment on CoreOS.

That’s just what IBM announced in October. All of this makes the recent news surrounding OpenShift’s integration in the storage platform consistent with IBM’s game plan for leveraging Red Hat’s assets.

“We’ve seen a steady cadence of features that integrate IBM’s storage solutions and OpenShift,” McDowell said. “They saw early that cloud native is the future of application delivery, and they have done a tremendous job of leveraging Red Hat’s assets to become a dominant player in that space. Many of us industry-watchers were skeptical of IBM’s Red Hat acquisition, but it’s proven to be a good move.”

Competitive shift

The integration of Red Hat’s OpenShift and data software solutions, such as Turbonomic with IBM’s storage hardware, is just a first step. As data management and storage solutions move to the cloud, IBM is riding this wave, as evidenced by its deal with Microsoft Azure.

The game plan in storage is becoming clearer. Build bridges to the public cloud, bolster AIOps capabilities and drive integration with Red Hat OpenShift.

This approach also signals a divergence away from IBM’s competition with traditional storage vendors such as Dell Technologies Inc. or NetApp Inc., according to Moor Insights’ McDowell. IBM will still sell file servers to midrange clients and keep everyone happy, but the landscape has shifted.

The real story is now about IBM’s moves to meet customer expectations in providing cloud native and application management services. The latest storage announcements reveal how the company is assembling and integrating key parts of its business to deliver on that strategy.

“IBM is really playing an entirely different game; it’s not apples-to-apples,” McDowell said. “None of IBM’s traditional competitors have this level of IP. At this point it’s going to come down to balancing execution and strategy. IBM’s challenge, and what we need to watch, is how well they execute the integration of the various pieces.”

Photo: Dan Farber-Flickr