NetApp Partners with Google Cloud for Cloud Data Storage Flexibility

NetApp, an intelligent data infrastructure company, has announced an extension of its collaboration with Google Cloud. This aims to simplify organizations' process of harnessing their data for generative AI (GenAI) and other hybrid cloud tasks.

NetApp and Google Cloud introduce the Flex service level for Google Cloud NetApp Volumes, offering support for storage volumes of varying sizes. Additionally, NetApp is unveiling a preview of its GenAI toolkit reference architecture for retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) operations on the Google Cloud Vertex AI platform.

Google Cloud and NetApp are introducing a service level named Flex for NetApp Volumes. For customers with finer control, assisting them to tailor their storage and performance to suit the requirements of their cloud workloads.

“Increasing demand for data-intensive applications and insights has reinforced the need for a new approach to unified data storage that gives organizations the agility to move and store data wherever it is needed at any point in time,” said Pravjit Tiwana, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Cloud Storage at NetApp. “By extending our collaboration with Google Cloud, we’re delivering a flexible form factor that can be run on existing infrastructure across Google Cloud system without any tradeoffs to enterprise data management capabilities.”

The incorporation of Flex expands the array of choices available to NetApp Volumes users, who now have access to four distinct service levels. These options are for customers to utilize a fully managed file service constructed on NetApp ONTAPTM and overseen by Google Cloud:

Standard: Multipurpose storage featuring advanced data management functionalities and a performance rate of 16MiB/sec per TiB, for accommodating workloads like file shares, virtual machines (VMs), and DevTest environments.

• Premium: Durable storage equipped with advanced data management functionalities having a performance rate of 64MiB/sec per TiB, specifically suited for file shares, virtual machines (VMs), and databases.
• Extreme: Data management capabilities and a performance rate of 128MiB/sec per TiB, for Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) databases and applications requiring low latency. 
• Flex: Accessible storage volumes with scalability ranging from one GiB to 100TiB and potential performance up to one GiB/s, depending on the size of the underlying storage pool. This flexible service level accommodates diverse use cases, including applications in the field of AI.

“Google Cloud NetApp Volumes remain a critical component of every enterprise’s digital transformation strategy,” said Sameet Agarwal, GM/VP, of Google Cloud Storage at Google Cloud. “Utilising Google Cloud technologies, NetApp Volumes will power new capabilities that can improve how businesses operate and create real-world value for their organizations.”

The Flex service level is set to be accessible by Q2 2024 across 15 Google Cloud regions, with plans to extend availability to additional Google Cloud regions by the conclusion of 2024.

Enterprise Data for Generative AI in Google Cloud

NetApp is unveiling a preview of its GenAI toolkit, now compatible with NetApp Volumes. This feature, coupled with its reference architecture, expedites the deployment of RAG operations. It reportedly offers secure, consistent, and automated workflows, connecting data stored in NetApp Volumes with the Google Cloud Vertex AI platform.

“As the intelligent data infrastructure company, we have capabilities to support data classification, tagging, mobility, and cloning for data wherever it lives so our customers can run secure AI data pipelines,” said Pravjit Tiwana, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Cloud Storage at NetApp. “Building on our partnership with Google Cloud to streamline RAG enables customers to tap into AI services and models.”

The NetApp GenAI toolkit is designed for RAG processes through its distinctive capabilities, such as:
Common data footprint everywhere: NetApp ONTAP is for customers to integrate data from any environment into their RAG initiatives. This integration streamlines operational procedures, mitigates risks, lowers costs, and accelerates time-to-results.
Automated classification and tagging: NetApp's BlueXP classification service autonomously labels data, facilitating data cleansing during both the data ingestion and inferencing stages of the data pipeline.

Scalable snapshots: ONTAP Snapshot enables rapid creation of space-efficient, in-place copies of vector stores and databases, providing near-instantaneous rollback to a prior version in case of data corruption or facilitating point-in-time analysis by moving forward.
Real-time cloning at scale: ONTAP FlexClone technology generates clones of vector index stores, and prompts the availability of relevant data for various queries by different users, all without affecting the primary production data.

“GenAI is a tidal wave of opportunity for the companies that can effectively apply their data to their industry,” said Miles Ward, CTO at SADA, An Insight Company. “At SADA we are pairing our extensive expertise with NetApp and Vertex AI to help customers accelerate their AI journeys.”