Posts tagged ‘cloud computing’
Iron Mountain Acquires Mimosa Systems
Mimosa Systems has been acquired by Iron Mountain, experts in managing and protecting both physical and digital information. Mimosa will join Iron Mountain Digital, the company’s technology arm, which provides information management services and solutions for data protection and recovery, archiving, eDiscovery and intellectual property management.
A fast-growing archiving company, Mimosa is known for its next-generation solution for e-mail, file and SharePoint archiving. In the last few years, Mimosa has gained the trust of more than 1,000 enterprise customers and hundreds of partners to deliver solutions that store, manage and protect enterprise content. Mimosa Systems’ customers will have the assurance of the global presence, trusted brand and financial stability of Iron Mountain.
The combination of the NearPoint on-premises archiving software with Iron Mountain’s cloud-based technologies allows the merged company to manage information wherever it resides, whether inside the firewall or in the cloud or through a hybrid model, providing greater flexibility and choice for managing information. With “location-independent” archiving, users can move data between the on-premises data center and the cloud transparently and seamlessly.
By combining NearPoint for collection and preservation with Stratify eVantage, an on-premises eDiscovery appliance for early-case assessment, and Stratify Legal Discovery services for review and production, the result is a complete, end-to-end eDiscovery solution.
“We are very excited about the fit and synergies between our two companies’ technology, culture and market approach. Iron Mountain is acquiring the Mimosa team and their expertise, not just their technology. The Mimosa team will become an integral part of Iron Mountain Digital and will help support the company’s information management service strategy,” said T. M. Ravi, Founder, President and CEO of Mimosa Systems, who will become Chief Marketing Officer of Iron Mountain Digital, responsible for driving marketing functions and playing a key role in strategy planning and execution.
iStore Launches Digital Oilfield Online for the Cloud
iStore launched Digital Oilfield Online, a cloud-based hosting service for its PetroTrek® software suite, at the Microsoft Global Energy Forum. iStore, which helps oil and gas companies access, organize and visualize exploration and production (E&P) data, has adopted the Microsoft Windows Azure Services platform for delivering Digital Oilfield solutions in the cloud.
On-premise Digital Oilfield technology requires substantial IT infrastructure to support data storage and information delivery. With the launch of Digital Oilfield Online, iStore will tackle the industry’s information management needs by applying the on-demand scalability, elastic computing and new cost structure offered by cloud computing. The new service creates immediate value, saving companies as much as $200,000 on hardware and software, in addition to recurring maintenance and operating costs.
Digital Oilfield Online allows oil and gas companies to host their information-centric Digital Oilfield projects securely online. This includes asset management, production monitoring, health /environment / safety management, and joint venture collaboration. It also enables leveraging of on-premise data and external E&P content, such as IHS wells and production data, through iStore’s data access and integration technology. The new service supports the Public Petroleum Data Model (PPDM), an open standard widely accepted by the industry for business-oriented data storage. This gives companies a roadmap for moving data management to the cloud.
“iStore is led by the market and our customers are telling us that agile, elastic IT is very important to their business going forward,” commented Barry Irani, president and CEO of iStore. “Cloud computing not only helps our customers eliminate costly hardware and server software licenses, it jump-starts Digital Oilfield projects by cutting out the time-consuming infrastructure procurement process associated with delivering decision support solutions. The industry as a whole will make the leap when they know that their information is as safe or safer outside the corporate firewall – that’s why we consider data security the number one priority for doing business in the cloud.”
To ensure that Digital Oilfield Online meets the rigorous security standards required by the petroleum industry, CSC, a Windows Azure Technology Adoption Program (TAP) partner, is assisting iStore with architectural review, security auditing and the commercialization of the service.
“CSC is proud to team with iStore on the Digital Oilfield Online. CSC is at the forefront of cloud computing through our work with clients and CSC’s Leading Edge Forum. As a result of our research and hands-on experience, our clients are benefiting from a cost-effective platform that enhances collaboration and improves asset optimization and business performance. The cloud makes this innovative solution available to a wide range of E&P companies in a very flexible business model,” said Bob Welch, president of CSC’s Chemical, Energy and Natural Resources Group.
In 2009, CSC and iStore announced an alliance agreement in which CSC would act as primary systems integrator in the global distribution of iStore’s PetroTrek solutions.
“iStore’s Digital Oilfield Online offering is an example of the type of solution Microsoft envisioned when we launched Windows Azure to the oil and gas industry earlier this year,” said Craig Hodges, Microsoft general manager, Manufacturing & Resources Sector. “Today’s oilfield business and operations climate is defined by unprecedented complexities and the continuing need to do more with less. Solutions like this one that eliminate costs and promote better business intelligence using the Microsoft platform in a secure computing environment will be instrumental in launching a new level of efficiency in the industry.”
iStore Turns 15, Plans to Take Digital Oilfield to the Cloud
The Information Store (iStore), a “digital oilfield” pioneer, celebrated its 15th anniversary with customers from around the globe at an event at the St. Regis Hotel in Houston, TX. The company’s PetroTrek® Web-based software enables oil and gas companies to connect disparate islands of E&P data to enhance business intelligence and decision-making at a fraction of the cost of traditional approaches. Today, PetroTrek supports common industry platforms such as Microsoft Office SharePoint Server, and is used by Marathon Oil, BP, and some of the other largest oil companies in the world. iStore makes it easy for geoscientists, engineers and managers to identify, track, capture and share corporate knowledge to support exploration and production asset management, including field optimization and reservoir management.
Phiroz “Daru” Darukhanavala, Chief Technology Officer for BP, who delivered the keynote address at the event, recalled when data was hard to uncover. “We used to say ‘wouldn’t it be nice to have more data, so we can make better decisions?’ Be careful what you wish for. Now we are drowning in a sea of data. Today we collect every second what we used to collect in a week. Data is useless until you can make it actionable, which iStore enables us to do.”
Going forward, the company plans to introduce the oil and gas industry’s first cloud computing service offering. This new computing model takes the digital oilfield to the next level by allowing oil companies to improve efficiency and productivity, reduce operating costs, and enhance asset management and business intelligence. Stay tuned to PetroComputing for more details.
DocVerse Brings Real-time Sharing to Microsoft Apps
DocVerse announced the launch of its new downloadable plug-in for Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel, which turns those applications into full-fledged, Web-based collaboration tools. The plug-in makes any .doc, .ppt or .xls file into a secure, Web-based document that can be shared and edited by multiple users anytime, anywhere.
DocVerse makes sharing Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel documents synonymous with saving them. Anytime a DocVerse user saves a document on their desktop, DocVerse automatically creates a Web-based version of it in the cloud, which is instantly shared with whomever the author has specified. All Web-based versions of a document receive a unique, secure, shareable URL that never changes and can be accessed by anyone the author invites to view it – whether they have downloaded the DocVerse plug-in or not. Users can view and comment on the most recent version of the document online using any Web browser, or via the DocVerse plug-in inside of Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel.
Groups of DocVerse users are able to use Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel to simultaneously edit the same document at the same time, whether online or offline. DocVerse tracks, manages and syncs all changes to merge them correctly into one updated version of the document – even if they save changes to the same document at the same exact time. For DocVerse users, that means no more e-mailing of attachments or repeatedly cutting and pasting changes manually to collaborate on documents with colleagues.
“This is huge step forward for Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel, which turns those unconnected islands on 600 million desktops worldwide into connected, Web-enabled collaboration tools in a way that no product has ever done before,” said Shan Sinha, CEO of DocVerse. “And, best of all, you don’t need to learn anything new. DocVerse quickly and easily plugs into Word, PowerPoint and Excel, so you can keep working with those applications exactly the same way you always have; it just makes them better.”
IceWEB Launches Cloud Storage Appliances
Virginia-based IceWEB Inc. has launched the Iplicity Cloud Storage Appliance (CSA) product line, which can be deployed either as SAN or NAS devices to deliver high-performance, scalable capabilities deployed in a centrally managed Private Storage Cloud or in a Hybrid Public/Private Cloud configuration.
Gary Dunham, Sr. VP Product Development & Engineering at IceWEB, described the offering: “Iplicity Cloud Storage Appliance is the first commercially available Cloud Storage device geared toward allowing its users, businesses of any size, to simply attach a pre-configured appliance to their network and immediately begin serving vast amounts of file and data storage space to local, remote, Internet or VPN connected users and applications. This appliance allows corporations to gain all of the benefits of Cloud Storage – positioning content closer to the originators, users and applications, control of replication and backup throughout the enterprise, centralized management of geographically dispersed data and much more – without assuming the risks of putting priceless company data in the hands of third-party providers. Iplicity CSA customers can also opt to make their content and storage resources available not only to their own users but also to authenticated partners via the internet – while still maintaining private back-links to the corporate IT infrastructure, thus ensuring both data security and consistent quality of service.”
Iplicity CSA greatly reduces the complexity of use by implementing a straightforward management Graphical User Interface (GUI) from which network support staff can easily manage the global storage appliance solution with a great deal of granularity. Once difficult tasks such as growing volumes, dragging and dropping space wherever needed (thin provisioning), reconfiguring network connectivity, creating multiple automatic replications of useable data at diverse locations, can all be performed live without impacting overall systems availability.
Iplicity CSA provides unified storage, allowing both applications and users to be granted access to their data by the widest range of protocols available (CIFS, NFS, iSCSI, FC, AOE, WEBDAV and RSYNC), affording organizations flexibility and range in how the data is accessed. The appliances also offer advanced data protection and replication capabilities, which allow organizations to drive content to different locations for different uses as dictated by their own unique needs.
Deployment is quick and easy. From un-boxing to live deployment, the pre-configured Cloud Storage Appliances can be configured on the client network and rendered ready to begin serving data in less than 20 minutes. Management and monitoring of the appliances is also quite intuitive with easy-to-understand dashboard interfaces displaying CPU utilization, network I/O and disk I/O, and the capability to “drill down” as deeply as necessary. Fully automated reporting and “e-mail home” capabilities will alert network staff to any pending, system self\-healed, or pending issues.
The 19-inch, rack-mountable Iplicity Cloud Storage Appliances are available in three pre-configured models:
- CSA-2000 – a base level appliance with 8TB of storage and the Iplicity Management Software;
- CSA-4000 – with 16TB expandable to 192TB; and
- CSA-8000 – with 24TB expandable to 192TB.
Both the CSA-4000 and CSA-8000 are also available in an optional Active/Active High Availability configuration.
PetroComputing 