Photo from behind a man working at dual monitor workstation with coding on screen. In the background a woman walks in data center area, behind glass. Textured pattern overlay can be seen with orange diamond shape near upper left corner.Photo from behind a man working at dual monitor workstation with coding on screen. In the background a woman walks in data center area, behind glass. Textured pattern overlay can be seen with orange diamond shape near upper left corner.

APEX

Dell APEX Storage for Public Cloud Simplifies Multicloud Complexity

Bring Dell storage innovation to public clouds alongside APEX console enhancements.
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Dell Technologies World 2023 is in full swing, and we couldn’t be more excited about the multicloud announcements we’re making this year. The siloed nature of multicloud environments makes it difficult to realize their full innovation potential due to a range of challenges including lack of control and visibility, unpredictable costs, siloed management experiences, difficult application and data mobility processes and inconsistent security and compliance. Last year we introduced Project Alpine to help solve for these challenges – an initiative to bring the unique software IP of our leading storage platforms to major public clouds, enriching the public cloud storage experience and providing operational consistency for our customers. This year we’re delivering on the promise of Project Alpine with Dell APEX Storage for Public Cloud, a brand new portfolio of software-defined, customer-managed storage offers that bring Dell’s enterprise-class performance, scale and cyber resiliency to major hyperscalers along with new management tools that centralize management activities across clouds in the Dell APEX Console.  

Operational Consistency from Ground to Cloud 

Offers in the Dell APEX Storage for Public Cloud portfolio provide operational consistency from on-premises to public cloud, giving you the extreme flexibility to seamlessly move data and workloads between on-premises and public cloud as your strategy evolves. Consolidated management across public clouds in Dell APEX Console provides enhanced productivity for IT teams, as they use the same skills, APIs, management experiences and enterprise-class storage services wherever Dell storage is deployed.  

Enterprise-class Storage 

We have an extensive data protection footprint in the cloud, and we’re now extending our cloud offers with the addition of Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS, Dell APEX Block Storage for Microsoft Azure and Dell APEX File Storage for AWS to address a broad range of workloads and use cases. 

For those looking to support large databases and containerized database workloads, analytics workloads or multiple container deployments, or those who want to consolidate workloads in the public cloud, there’s Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS. This brings the high performance, linear scalability and advanced data services of Dell’s software-defined block storage, PowerFlex, to AWS. This offer’s scale-out architecture provides extreme performance by aggregating data access across a cluster, leading to high IOPs and low latency. This offer also features unique multi-access zone (AZ) availability, ensuring data access without replication or loss of performance by federating our storage protection across three AZs. Later this year, we’re bringing these same capabilities to Microsoft Azure with Dell APEX Block Storage for Microsoft Azure.  

Bring your file-based workloads to public cloud, whether it’s IT workloads like file shares or home directories, industry workloads like M&E, health care and financial services, or emerging workloads like AI/ML and analytics. Dell APEX File Storage for AWS brings PowerScale OneFS, our leading file storage software, to AWS. Using the same software that powers our #1 Global NAS solution,1 this offer provides seamless data mobility between on-prem and cloud with native replication, consistent user experiences with familiar OneFS web UI, CLI and API interfaces and the same identity management with built-in security features as the on-prem proven platform, trusted by more than 17,000 customers worldwide. Dell APEX File Storage for AWS provides high performance in the cloud in a scale-out architecture and includes the same enterprise-class features our customers enjoy on-premises today like multi-protocol support (NFS, SMB, S3), SyncIQ native replication, snapshots, CloudPools and data reduction.  

As an added layer of protection for your data, Dell APEX Protection Storage for Public Cloud brings in-cloud instances of Dell PowerProtect DD Virtual Edition into the Dell APEX Portfolio. This offer already delivers industry-leading data protection storage for AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and Alibaba Cloud with more than 17 exabytes of data protected in the cloud to date.2 Scalable up to 256TB per instance, Dell APEX Protection Storage supports a broad ecosystem of backup applications and enables users to maintain control and ensure data immutability, with the ability to replicate data between cloud and on-premises or between clouds. 

A Centrally Managed Multicloud Future 

Screen capture from the Dell APEX console showing Discover and Deploy options for APEX Storage for Publich Cloud and APEX Navigator for Kubernetes.
Centralized management in the Dell APEX Console.

Arriving in the second half of this year, our two new SaaS-based management tools collapse multicloud sprawl and centrally manage activities in the Dell APEX console. Dell APEX Navigator for Multicloud Storage makes it easy to manage Dell Storage across multiple public clouds. Get up and running fast with easy configuration and automated provisioning and deployment that only takes four steps. Make decisions based on intelligent insights from CloudIQ, move data between on-premises and public cloud from a single UI while accelerating Zero Trust, with capabilities like role-based access control, single sign-on and federated identity. This tool can also be integrated with your preferred IT automation tools like Ansible and Terraform thanks to our API-first architecture.  

Improve your container management experience with Dell APEX Navigator for Kubernetes – a unified user experience that simplifies Kubernetes persistence management across multicloud, multisite environments. Storage admins and DevOps organizations can leverage complete storage services management at scale for their Kubernetes ecosystem. This provides access to advanced data services, such as application mobility, authorization and more through the easy deployment and management of Dell Container Storage Modules. As a result, enterprises can streamline Kubernetes persistence management, empower their DevOps teams and govern and protect across environments (both on-premises and in the cloud).  

If you’re attending Dell Technologies World 2023, stop by the Dell APEX Multicloud and as-a-Service booth for more information, demos and conversations with our multicloud experts. Check out the APEX Storage for Public Cloud page for more information.  

1 Dell is ranked #1 globally in NAS solutions for external OEM storage in Q4/CY23 per IDC’s Quarterly Enterprise Storage Systems Tracker, 2022Q4 

2 Based on Dell Technologies analysis, February 2023 

About the Author: Magi Kapoor

Magi Kapoor is a seasoned product management leader and is driving Dell Technologies Multicloud SaaS strategy. She has 20 years of experience in the storage industry with responsibilities spanning product management, systems engineering, technical marketing, business strategy and product development. Magi has a track record of successfully launching and managing full lifecycle of multiple enterprise storage products and cloud offerings. Magi holds a B.S. in Computer Science from Iowa State University, and an MBA from Babson College. Connect with Magi on X @Magi_Kapoor.