IBM Beefs Up Big Data With StoredIQ Purchase

IBM is adding to its big data capabilities after it agreed to acquire StoredIQ, a provider of solutions for handling unstructured enterprise data.

Financial terms of the deal to acquire the privately-held Austin, Texas-based software company were not disclosed.

Storage Demands

However, the move bolsters IBM’s big data analytics initiatives by expanding Big Blue’s Information Lifecycle Governance (ILG) suite, which helps companies analyse, automate and implement governance policies across big data and dispose of that information in an automated way.

StoredIQ will advance IBM’s efforts to help clients derive value from big data and respond more efficiently to litigation and regulations, dispose of information that has outlived its purpose and lower data storage costs, IBM officials said. The addition of StoredIQ capabilities also enables IBM customers to find and use unstructured information of value.

IBM has invested more than $16 billion (£9.8bn) in more than 30 analytics-related acquisitions. In 2012 alone, IBM closed nine acquisitions, including Kenexa, Tealeaf, Vivisimo, Varicent, Worklight, Green Hat, Emptoris, DemandTec and Platform Computing. The StoredIQ acquisition also builds on the 2010 acquisition of PSS Systems and Vivisimo and adds to IBM’s capabilities in rapid discovery, effective governance and timely disposal of data, the company said.

According to analyst reports, an estimated 2.5 quintillion bytes of data are created every day, IBM said. Data volume growth now far exceeds budget and revenue growth rates for most organisations, and it overwhelms legal hold processes, records and retention management, and allocation and decommissioning of applications. In fact, information volume doubles every 18 to 24 months in most organisations.

However, the need to understand what information exists, and to manage it, has also grown exponentially. Whether required for legal e-discovery, compliance mandates, internal governance or storage optimisation, fundamentally, this mountain of data now represents enormous risk and cost to a company. Companies need a smart solution to overcome these big data challenges.

“CIOs and general counsels are overwhelmed by volumes of information that exceed their budgets and their capacity to meet legal requirements,” Deidre Paknad, vice president of Information Lifecycle Governance at IBM, said in a statement. “With this acquisition, IBM adds to its unique strengths as a provider able to help CIOs and attorneys rapidly drive out excess information cost and mitigate legal risks while improving information utility for the business.”

Unstructured Data

As a result, business leaders can access and analyse big data to gain insights for better decision-making. Legal teams can mitigate risk by meeting e-discovery obligations more effectively. Or they can analyse big data in place, estimate review costs and make strategic “settle versus argue” decisions far earlier in the process. Also, IT departments can dispose of unnecessary data and align information cost to value to take out excess costs.

“Together, IBM and StoredIQ can empower organisations to more efficiently use and govern their unstructured data to increase its value and eliminate unnecessary cost and risk,” Phil Myers, CEO of StoredIQ, said in a statement. “IBM and StoredIQ are longstanding partners with existing integration between IBM’s Information Lifecycle Governance suite and StoredIQ’s active data management software.”

StoredIQ software provides scalable analysis and governance of disparate and distributed email as well as file shares and collaboration sites, IBM said. This includes the ability to discover, analyse, monitor, retain, collect, de-duplicate and dispose of data. In addition, StoredIQ can rapidly analyse high volumes of unstructured data and automatically dispose of files and emails in compliance with regulatory requirements.

IBM’s portfolio includes solutions that enable organisations to capture, manage and share content, no matter where it exists; assess and derive insight from content to improve outcomes; and provide lifecycle governance for content from capture through retirement.

Last month, Gartner named IBM the overall market share and total content revenue leader in its “2012 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Content Management.” According to Gartner’s market-share analysis, IBM is the leading software vendor with 19 percent market share, outgrowing the market and extending its lead over that of its closest competitor. With an increasing focus on high-value solutions, Gartner reported IBM is leveraging its position as an infrastructure vendor with broad software and hardware stacks, a deep partner channel and global footprint.

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Originally published on eWeek.