IBM and Hitachi Extend Storage Interoperability

IBM, Hitachi, Ltd., and its wholly owned subsidiary, Hitachi Data Systems, this week announced a strategic technology agreement that will extend interoperability between the companies’ storage servers and allow customers to more easily deploy open storage networks.

According to the companies, IBM has licensed to Hitachi the key storage Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for its Enterprise Storage Server(TM) (code named Shark). As a result, Hitachi will be able to continue to maintain compatibility with IBM’s Peer to Peer Remote Copy (PPRC(TM)) and Extended Remote Copy (XRC(TM)), and will now be able to incorporate such functions as FlashCopy, Multiple Allegiance, and Parallel Access Volumes (PAV) on its own enterprise storage system products marketed globally as the Hitachi Freedom Storage(TM) Lightning 9900(TM) Series.

In return, Hitachi has licensed APIs for the Lightning 9900 to IBM. IBM will now be able to support such functions as Hitachi’s NanoCopy(TM) and ShadowImage on its Shark server.