In a recent interview, Sajai Krishnan, CEO of Parascale, made some interesting observations about the needs of the cloud storage marketplace and how the offerings from Parascale met them.
Krishnan gives us his perspective of the cloud storage market and current opportunities in that space, primarily helping service providers build their own cloud storage offering to retain customers who might otherwise look to Amazon S3.
We welcome competition in this space.
While we agree with his assessment of the market, there are four claims that deserve a fact check:
CLAIM #1: ".. in terms of a cloud storage software solution, "pretty much" we are the only game in town"
That depends on how you define the phrase "pretty much." At Mezeo, we have focused on the service provider market from day one. And unlike Parascale, our software is in production with hosting providers - exhibit A: Softlayer. Watch Softlayer CEO Lance Crosby discuss why he chose Mezeo >>
But don't take our word alone. Here's Simon Robinson, Research Director at the 451 Group:
Unlike the myriad other companies tackling this fragmented and nascent market, Mezeo is focusing its efforts on delivering a platform that enables service providers to deploy cloud storage services to their own customers. The company, which was created a year ago, already has engagements with several managed hosting service providers...
As it comes out of the gate with its first raft of cloud storage services, Mezeo simultaneously stresses that it's not another cloud storage services company. This may sound disingenuous, but on closer examination it's clear that there's a big difference between what the likes of ParaScale and EMC Atmos are doing and what Mezeo is offering. Ultimately, Mezeo is pretty much agnostic as to the specific flavor of storage; it's differentiation is its ability to help service providers quickly deploy a range of feature-rich storage services, adding value where none exists today, and utilizing incumbent capabilities where they do exist. With so much of the interest in cloud computing focused on service providers, we think Mezeo has emerged at the right time with a novel platform.
Download the full report at www.mezeo.com
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CLAIM #2: "...yes we do S3-type or REST protocols..."
NOT. ParaScale has no REST-style APIs. In fact, it is unclear if ParaScale is using any APIs at all.
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CLAIM #3: Krishnan claims his focus is on service providers
Not quite! If we examine ParaScale's pricing model, and listen to what he says, it's the same old CAPEX.
The traditional "Pay-upfront" model is not cloud-friendly, while a "pay-per-use" model is. The major benefit of cloud storage is the economics of "pay-per-use," as we have stressed on this blog earlier.
Pay-up-front or pay-for-capacity (versus pay-per-use) completely defies the economics of "Cloud Storage" which is all about "pay for use." Asking providers to have a cost model that is not aligned with their revenue model brings into question ParaScale's focus on and understanding of the service provider market.
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CLAIM #4: Krishnan states that hosting providers will have to deploy cloud storage solutions to take on Amazon S3 and Google.
There is one point we agree on: hosting providers will indeed have to deploy cloud storage solutions to take on Amazon S3 and Google.
We have been blogging about this from the very beginning. Good to see Krishnan getting on board.
Here's to the competition. As the saying goes, let's stick to "just the facts!"
>> UPDATED: see Fact Checking the Fact Check
Steve
Thanks for your comments. But please lets not confuse the customer - there is enough "cloudiness" already. Have Deepak do the research. He has been on our site enough times :-). Let the customer choose based on the facts, as you say.
I am sorry you are offended that I did not count Mezeo as a cloud storage player. But you don't store bits like EMC ATMOS, or us. ParaScale has the object-based, scalable file system technology the same as Amazon S3, or Google GFS. Storage cloud buyers today, need to see if vendors like Mezeo or ParaScale have a solution to store bits. Mezeo provides useful service enablers and interfaces (the front end if you might), whereas ParaScale, ATMOS etc provide the service pathways as well the ability to store bits. A quick check on Linked-In about the storage-DNA and backgrounds of key players, is always a good thing when vendors say they are selling storage.
IMHO your focus is on the front end of cloud storage service. You leave it to the service provider how he/she stores the bits. That's OK to start - but without a scalable, economical backend why will someone succeed against S3, GDrive and 10 others? That's what determines the economics.
To your points take in turn:
#1: We are the only SW based cloud storage solution. True. EMC ATMOS is the other cloud storage service provider solution - but you have to buy hardware. Mezeo's solution does not store bits and so my definition it is not a storage solution. I am not saying that you are not delivering value to your customers- your solution is just not a storage solution. The customer has to figure out how to store the bits in addition. As Simon says in the report he wrote for you "there’s a big difference between what the likes of ParaScale and EMC Atmos are doing and what Mezeo is offering".
#2: About APIs, we have provided WebDAV from day 1 with other protocols on the way. Again, you should do your research.
#3: Steve - about our pricing models, you are really not in a good position to know this. Service providers who read this - please feel free to call us. You will not be disappointed. And please see our launch announcement highlighting Carpathia hosting http://www.parascale.com/index.php/parascale-delivers-next-breakthrough. Sorry, so it is not only Mezeo that is trying to serve service providers with storage cloud solutions.
#4: Excellent - we do have some agreement.
Anyways, Steve as I mentioned to Bill, your SVP of sales in London in June, there maybe ways in which we can work together to solve our service provider customers' problems even better.
Be well,
Sajai, CEO ParaScale.
I agree we shouldn't confuse the customer.
Storing bits is of course an important aspect of storage, but as our customers know, storing bits doesn't make a storage system a CLOUD storage system. The significance of a Cloud Storage solution is in its anywhere/anytime accessibility, in particular via Web services APIs (in our case, RESTful APIs). Smartphone access, Webtop access, desktop access, application access (via APIs) and server access via WebDAV are also important. By the way, WebDAV is not an API, it is a protocol... our customers know this too.
So, while you are correct in saying Mezeo doesn't store bits, Mezeo is a Cloud Storage Software Solution because we bring EVERYTHING to the party a service provider needs to get into the Cloud Storage business. Service providers already know how to purchase and provision systems that store bits. What they need is the software functionality that converts their bit-storing systems into a Cloud Storage offering that beats Amazon S3 and Rackspace Cloud Files on all the critical factors, and they need that software to be deployable on their own infrastructure in a way that fully integrates with their internal OSS, provisioning and billing systems. They also want a brandable solution. We provide all of these things, which makes Mezeo the only complete Cloud Storage software solution for service providers. This is why 100% of our customers are service providers, and why the list continues to grow both in the US and abroad.
We welcome the competition, but we will continue to set the record straight on the critical issues.
Thanks, Steve