NetApp Teams with VMware, AWS to Help Customers Modernize and Scale Enterprise Workloads on the Cloud

NetApp® a global, cloud-led, data-centric software company, in collaboration with VMware, Inc. and Amazon Web Services (AWS), announced the general availability of Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP with VMware Cloud on AWS, the first and only native AWS cloud storage service certified and supported as a supplemental datastore for VMware Cloud on AWS.

With this new datastore solution, enterprises can quickly, easily, and cost-effectively move their enterprise, data-demanding workloads to VMware Cloud on AWS. This allows organizations to scale cloud storage independent of cloud computing to optimize costs, deploy new modern applications with the speed and scalability of the cloud, and maximize the value of their existing IT investments. Additionally, organizations can gain access to the rich data management, protection, and efficiency benefits of ONTAP utilized by nearly twenty thousand VMware customers running on-premises.

“Our strong relationship, deep integration, and joint innovation with both VMware and AWS hit another milestone, which helps make it easier for organizations to efficiently move enterprise workloads to the cloud,” said Phil Brotherton, Vice President, Solutions & Alliances at NetApp. “VMware customers running on NetApp or non-NetApp storage on-premises can now access the enterprise-class public cloud storage services and features of ONTAP, all running on AWS, as the first certified and supported supplemental datastore to VMware Cloud on AWS.”

“The majority of enterprises today run workloads on a VMware platform. Whether that is on-premises or in VMware Cloud on AWS, they want to be able to leverage consistency in operations and architecture,” said Narayan Bharadwaj, Vice President, Cloud Solutions at VMware. “AWS, NetApp, and VMware are giving customers the flexibility to buy and configure cloud storage independent of computing to meet the needs of a wide variety of enterprise applications. Our co-innovation will enable customers to move enterprise workloads to the cloud to cost-optimize and better scale their environments.”

“The strong collaboration between NetApp, VMware, and AWS is enabling organizations to innovate with greater speed and efficiency while minimizing cost, giving them greater freedom to move workloads between on-prem and multi-cloud environments,” said Sanjay Rohatgi, Senior Vice President and General Manager, NetApp Asia Pacific & Japan. “We look forward to working with customers across the region to accelerate their move to the cloud and in turn, spur the further transformation of their business.”

New benefits from this certified and supported offering include improved:

• Speed: Migrate data-demanding on-premises vSphere-based workloads with NetApp or non-NetApp storage to VMware Cloud on AWS with reduced complexity – leveraging consistent VMware-to-VMware migration for workloads combined with the speed, performance, and simplicity of ONTAP via Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP.
• Cost Control: Scale VMware Cloud compute independently of cloud storage to optimize cost at scale for demanding workloads combined with the rich data efficiency features of ONTAP to control cost at scale, including dedupe, compression, compaction, and thin provisioning.
• Efficiency: Leverage existing VMware-centric resource investments including people, processes, and technologies from on-premises and on the cloud for consistency of operations.

In addition, partners of NetApp, VMware, and AWS can benefit from this innovation to expand their current offerings around VMware Cloud in multiple ways:

• Unlock new business for hybrid and cloud-native workloads by breaking down cost barriers to migrating enterprise workloads through right-sizing cloud computing and cloud storage.
• Expand existing cloud services helping customers plan, design, deploy and optimize enterprise hybrid and cloud-native solutions for data-demanding workloads.
• Reduce risk for their clients through integrated and supported cloud solutions from NetApp and VMware to help customers migrate, extend or protect enterprise workloads to the cloud with confidence.

“As a leading multi-brand provider of full stack IT solutions, our customers rely on us to deliver solutions and services to help them manage their most data-demanding workloads,” said Troy Brick-Margelofsky, Digital Infrastructure Team Lead at CDW. “With Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP as a certified and supported datastore for VMware Cloud, we can now help customers move workloads onto the cloud quickly and efficiently, saving them time, money, and resources with the added benefit of integration with the complete NetApp portfolio.”

Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP provides fully managed shared storage on AWS with the popular data access and management capabilities of ONTAP. The solution allows organizations to easily migrate applications and run them on AWS, with ONTAP’s enterprise-grade storage workflows and data management capabilities, regardless of their on-premises storage provider.

Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP supplemental datastore for VMware Cloud on AWS is available.