Driving Storage Innovation: APEX Cloud Platform for Microsoft Azure

In today’s fast-paced world, where innovation and success are the keys to staying ahead, Dell Technologies has always believed in meeting customers where they are. This core belief drives us to empower our customers by enabling them to thrive with the latest technological advancements. But we don’t stop there. At Dell, we take it one step further by consistently being the first to market with our groundbreaking solutions, ensuring that our customers are not just keeping up but leading the way.

That’s why we announced availability of Dell APEX Cloud Platform for Microsoft Azure last September. Collaboratively engineered with Microsoft, it was introduced as the first Premier Solution for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI, a category that includes platforms providing the fastest time to value for Azure hybrid cloud through the deepest levels of engineering integration with Microsoft. Our innovation with APEX Cloud Platform for Azure has delivered significant benefits for our joint customers, including as much as 85% lower costs of testing and 80% reduction in business issues according to a recent study by ESG.

Today, in collaboration with Microsoft, we’re pleased to announce another first in technological advancements for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI by adding support for Dell PowerFlex with the APEX Cloud Platform for Azure. This makes APEX Cloud Platform the first offer in the Microsoft Premier Solutions for Azure Stack HCI category to support linear scaling of storage resources independently from compute and Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct (S2D). By extending APEX Cloud Platform for Azure with a shared, universal storage layer based on Dell PowerFlex software-defined storage, the platform delivers greater control over where applications and data reside, whether on-premises or in the public cloud.

Exceptional Performance and Scalability for Modern Enterprises

The new solution has been tested by both Dell Technologies and Microsoft engineering teams and is designed to complement S2D. The APEX Cloud Platform for Azure with PowerFlex delivers a significant enhancement to the platform with unparalleled flexibility and performance to meet the diverse storage needs of modern enterprises.

“As we continue to innovate and empower our customers with cutting-edge solutions, the partnership with Dell and Microsoft is paramount. With the Dell APEX Cloud Platform for Microsoft Azure, customers gain great flexibility and simplicity by leveraging Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct alongside Dell’s enterprise-class software-defined block storage. By integrating Microsoft Azure Stack HCI with Dell software-defined block storage, this solution gives businesses the autonomy to deploy workloads across on-premises and in the Azure cloud.”

– Meena Gowdar, Group Principal PM Manager, Azure Edge and Platform – Microsoft

Designed with Storage Flexibility in Mind

APEX Cloud Platform for Azure combined with Dell PowerFlex enables users to extend their storage fabric with enterprise-class software-defined storage designed to ensure optimal storage performance and scalability. PowerFlex software creates a universal storage layer across on-premises Dell enterprise storage, Dell storage for public cloud and the APEX Cloud Platform. With intelligent management and automation, PowerFlex streamlines storage management and orchestrates data movement across these locations. Users gain access to numerous benefits:

• Ability to power mission-critical applications. PowerFlex excels in hosting applications that require high transactional performance and low latency, making it ideal for mission-critical databases and applications.
• Consistent I/O performance. It ensures consistent I/O performance for streaming, ingestion and reporting transactions, particularly within AI and data analytics environments, on a very small footprint with no performance bottlenecks.
• Exceptional availability. With a six 9s (99.9999%) availability, PowerFlex minimizes platform downtime to just 31.5 seconds per year. Its fast rebuild and rebalance operations further enhance resiliency.
• Extreme scalability. Modular scale-out architecture supports exponential data growth, allowing infrastructure to expand seamlessly as demand increases and utilize storage capacity to the fullest.
• Enhanced workload support. Run a highly diverse set of workloads, including mission-critical databases on a single common infrastructure, minimizing infrastructure silos.

Delivering Hybrid Cloud Innovation

The integration of Dell PowerFlex into APEX Cloud Platform for Microsoft Azure marks a significant milestone in our commitment to providing flexible, scalable and high-performance storage solutions. This new capability empowers our customers to meet their evolving storage needs with confidence, ensuring their critical applications run smoothly and efficiently.

Stay tuned for more updates as we continue to innovate and expand the capabilities of APEX Cloud Platform for Azure, bringing you the best in Microsoft Azure Stack HCI solutions.

Source: dell.com