Huawei IDI Forum: Building Data Infrastructure in the Multi-Cloud Era

A guest post from author, advisor, and influencer Elise Quevedo her impressions of the Huawei Innovative Data Infrastructure Forum that took place on May 23-24.

The Huawei Innovative Data Infrastructure Forum with a theme of “new data, new apps, new resilience”, took place in Munich, Germany, and brought together global industry experts and partners to explore the future of digital infrastructure towards the yottabyte era (a yottabyte is equal to a quadrillion gigabytes).

There was a strong opening by Jim Lu, President of the European Region, Senior VP Huawei when he said:

“Although there were many external challenges, Huawei remains focused and fully supportive of our customers with the best products and services. Last year Huawei’s R&D was over 25% of our annual revenue, probably the highest in the industry.”

That statement helps me understand why this Chinese tech giant is able to always deliver high-caliber products and solutions.

So let’s talk about data storage. As I recently read, human history is a story of data storage and transmission, from the first oracle bone inscriptions 3,500 years ago, to the advent of paper-making 2,100 years ago, and the emergence of digital storage more than 60 years ago.

Huawei has never stopped in its quest to make knowledge more accessible and data storage more efficient.

Why is data storage so crucial for enterprises?

Enterprises must have robust data storage systems to ensure business continuity and disaster recovery. Storing data in secure and redundant environments, such as off-site backups and cloud storage, safeguards against data loss due to hardware failures, natural disasters, cyberattacks, or other unexpected events. With proper data storage strategies, enterprises can quickly recover critical information and minimize downtime, ensuring uninterrupted operations.

As enterprises grow, their data storage needs to expand. Scalable data storage infrastructure allows organizations to accommodate increasing volumes of data without disruption. By implementing flexible storage solutions, enterprises can adapt to evolving business requirements, whether it’s handling larger datasets, supporting new applications, or accommodating a growing user base.

By investing in robust and efficient data storage solutions, organizations can unlock the value of their data and gain a competitive advantage in today’s data-driven business landscape.

Why is Huawei one of the top choices in the data storage industry?

Dr. Peter Zhou, Huawei’s President of IT Product Line said that Huawei Data Storage provides an extensive range of products and solutions to meet customers’ and partners’ evolving requirements.

As an example, OceanStor Dorado All-Flash Storage and OceanStor Pacific Scale-Out Storage were recognized as a 2023 Customers’ Choice in Gartner Peer InsightsTM. The partners that were on-site during the IDI Forum shared the same sentiment.

The tour of the IDI Exhibition area given by Fupeng Zhang, VP of Huawei IT line, was insightful. Data storage is the cornerstone of digital infrastructure that supports the globalization of the digital economy, and as such, collaboration is required to make breakthroughs to build better data storage.

Building a low-carbon society with green storage was an added bonus to help us understand how we can continue evolving in the tech industry whilst taking care of our planet. For data storage that means using green energy and renewable materials, green products for improved hardware density, reduced data volumes, and higher resource utilization.

A few places stood out for me, so I went back the next day to speak with Huawei experts Evangeline Wang, Product Management and Marketing Expert, and Cindy Hong, Container Storage Solution Architect.

Enterprises must have robust data storage systems to ensure business continuity and disaster recovery and Huawei offers the products and solutions to cover the challenges faced by the different industries, such as pathology, healthcare, finance O&G exploration, astronomical exploration, and telecommunications.

Multi-cloud is the new normal and 89% of enterprises have developed cloud strategies. Data centralization and application deployment in multi-cloud environments will become the optimal IT architecture in the future.

And because of all these newly developed strategies and more and more data being stored, enterprises have seen a surge in data security threats in recent years.

To combat this, Huawei has developed a ransomware protection storage solution. As the ultimate data carrier, storage must form the last line of defense for data resilience.

Related: Advice for CIOs: Protect Your Data from Different Ransomware Attacks

Thanks to Huawei’s industry-leading AI algorithm R&D capabilities, the solution delivers 99.9% accuracy against ransomware.

To sum up, in the next decade, digital technologies will help us move into an even bigger intelligent world. Intelligent data storage is the ideal choice for enterprises and Huawei has a full series of products and solutions to help achieve that.

Between the exhibition showcase and the keynotes we listened to during the IDI Forum, I learned that the key is to unlock the value of data towards the evolution of the data storage industry.

New data paradigms are being created and working with partners is key to this evolution.

I look forward to seeing how the C-Level and decision-makers in the industry embrace the power of the right data storage solutions. Because enterprises are now investing more in storage to protect their multi-cloud strategies.

Click the link to learn more about Huawei’s data storage solutions.

Let’s continue building the right partnerships around the globe because as I always say, together we are stronger.

Follow Elise on Twitter: @EliseQuevedo

Disclaimer: Any views and/or opinions expressed in this post by individual authors or contributors are their personal views and/or opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views and/or opinions of Huawei Technologies.