EMC’s purchase of Legato and forthcoming acquisition of Documentum Corp [DCTM] form a major commitment to Information Lifecycle Management (ILM), which has very recently emerged as a term covering the management of entire storage systems, including the rapidly growing volumes of unstructured or reference data, such as emails and text.
Because it hopes to boost its software sales, EMC has long been tipped as heading for a major battle with Veritas Software Corp [VRTS], the largest software-only vendor in the storage market. But yesterday EMC underlined the different direction it is taking to Veritas.
While Veritas is developing utility-style blade-server and storage systems software it gained with its purchases this year of Jareva Technologies Inc and Precise Software Solutions Inc, EMC is steering clear of this area.
In contrast to utility computing, partnering does not suit ILM due to the high level of integration needed
Veritas is not avoiding ILM entirely, even though there are gaps in its product line-up with respect to the area. Right now it admits that it cannot match the sophisticated content management software that EMC will acquire via it purchase of Documentum, but says it will plug the gap – at some unspecified date.
When the Legato acquisition was announced in the summer, Hewlett Packard [HPQ] said it saw no reason not to continue its OEM deal. Since then IBM [IBM] has extended its deal with Legato to cover more products.
Sun Microsystems Inc [SUNW] plans to continue selling Legato software, because it forms a sizeable of its revenues when it comes to backup.
EMC said that it and Legato’s research and development functions have already been combined. Legato – less around 150 employees will operate as a division retaining its own brand name.
This article was based on material originally published by ComputerWire.
