An Irish software company has developed two products which it expects to generate sales worth $15 million (€13.76) by the end of this year, and mark a new departure in the data storage industry.
Raidtec, a Cork-based company, is in Hanover this week to launch its new products at the annual technology exhibition, CeBIT.
According to Mr Noel May, Raidtec chairman and chief executive officer, its new increased capacity flexible storage units are already causing a stir. "There is no doubt this will be one of the hits of the show in Hanover. Nobody else in the data storage area is doing anything like this."
The Internet and electronic commerce are fuelling massive growth in the data storage market. Many companies are choosing to centralise their data in storage area networks (SANs) by linking their servers to one central storage farm.
Last year, technology industry analysts, Gartner Group, valued the SAN market at $100 million, and predicted it would increase to $3 billion by 2002. Storage component technology represents over half of this market. According to Mr May it is dominated by just Raidtec and one other company, Clarion, owned by Data General.
Raidtec expects its new products will extend its current lead on its competitors, already estimated at between six and nine months. Five new distributors have agreed to sign up with Raidtec at CeBIT, and distribute the FibreRAID HI (Host Independent) and FibreArray-12 as its flagship products.
The FibreRAID HI controller has been designed specifically for the SAN environment, and promises complete fault tolerance, whereby all primary data is backed up in real time. RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) technology keeps data safely online even if a hard disk fails. FibreRAID HI, which is capable of communicating with any type of computer, is currently being tested by a "good proportion" of original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), Mr May says. These would typically include IBM, Sun, Unisys and NCR.
The FibreArray-12 is a storage array tower format. The previous version, FibreArray-7, only had a maximum of seven drives. The new product comprises a 12-bay enclosure which can pack more than 40 per cent more storage into the tower. Raidtec says there is no other company on the market matching this at the moment.
Raidtec's advantage lies in its exploitation of fibre channel technology. Because it offers high speeds of 100 megabits per second, and high capacity, the product increasingly appeals to companies trying to handle vast amounts of data. Many organisations would use a range of platforms, including RS600, Solaris or Mac. Now they can pull together with Raidtec's FibreRAID HI product into a single SAN. Industry analysts have predicted the fibre channel market will grow to represent half the external storage market next year.
The latest products are the culmination of three years of design effort by Raidtec's team of 25 design engineers. Mr May predicts the 80-strong workforce will grow to 120 before the end of the year. Most of the new positions will be in the sales area as Raidtec comes under pressure to harness the global data storage market before competitors come online with their own products. This is likely to happen by mid-summer.
Raidtec, which had a turnover of $20 million last year, has been earmarked for a stock market flotation. However, Mr May says it will not happen this year, and will only go ahead in 2000 "if the time is right".
