Ellison's Pillar Data Moves Downscale, Upscale

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Targeting a broader base of potential customers, Pillar Data Systems is downscaling its high-end storage software and hardware, designed for consolidating multiple applications and tiers of storage.

Pillar Data also is upscaling its Axiom storage solution to polish its appeal to high-enterprises.

Funded with more than $200 million from Tako Ventures, the venture capital firm of Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, Pillar Data on Tuesday unveiled an entry-level Axiom configuration aimed at small to midsize enterprises, said Russ Kennedy, senior director of marketing and strategy at the San Jose, Calif.-based company.

"This lets us target customers outside our core market to date," Kennedy said. "And the downmarket product is targeted at the channel."

Solution providers said the move is key to Pillar Data's growth. Pillar Data has been struggling to find its identity with its focus on showing the return on investment for an expensive, 10-Tbyte storage system, said Dave Klauser, area director of sales for the northern U.S. at Insight Investments, an Irvine, Calif.-based solution provider and leasing firm.

"But as tight as the economy is, to get into the door, they need a lower entry price," Klauser said. "And the only way to do that is to strip down the components."

For the smaller enterprises, Pillar Data is offering an entry-level version of Axiom with a single "Slammer" instead of the up to four Slammers offered in its original version, Kennedy said. A Slammer is a high-performance data mover and manager that provides the Axiom's nonstop data access.

The entry-level version scales from 1.6 Tbytes to 24 Tbytes, compared with up to 170 Tbytes in the original version. It includes NAS and Fibre Channel SAN capability and is the first product from the company to offer iSCSI as an option.

However, users of the downscaled Axiom solution still can boost its performance as capacity grows, Kennedy said. The new offering is aimed at enterprises with annual sales of $25 million to $250 million, he added.

The solution, available through Bell Microproducts, costs $35,000 for the hardware and software, including 5 Tbytes of storage.

Klauser said the downscaled Axiom will be much more successful in the channel because of its low price. "It's something VARs should pay attention to," he said. "Pillar has not only adjusted the hardware cost, but also the software cost. But I caution VARs to look at what the uptick in price is when upgrading the software or going over 24 Tbytes of capacity."

For the high-end enterprise, Pillar Data is adding 15,000-rpm, 146-Gbyte, Fibre Channel drives from Seagate, giving it the ability to mix Fibre Channel and SATA drives for the first time, Kennedy said. That allows multiple tiers of storage to be supported in a single solution, he said.

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