The UK’s largest charity, which pours 500m pounds ($1m) into biomedical research every year, is using the Pillar Axiom storage area network system for data resilience, file sharing and digital archiving.
Scalability was key behind the decision to choose Pillar, as well as the fact that the system can be left online while extra capacity is added.
Being able to expand the storage system without taking it offline and at the same time ensuring it is transparent for anyone wishing to access network files and medical images, was essential, said Mark Bramwell, head of systems development at The Wellcome Trust.
Wellcome plans to cut its reliance on tape-based back-ups by mirroring data over its wide are network to a remote site. Off-peak bandwidth will be used to perform the replication.
With storage expanding to more than 350 terabytes within five years, it was important that the move to Pillar will help reduce demands on power, space and cooling, and cut costs in the process.
