EMC Data Protection Suite and the Concept of TCO (Total Cost of Ownership)
EMC recently announced that it was creating something called the EMC Data Protection Suite that consists of the following EMC data protection assets:
- Data Domain. The deduplication device company EMC purchased in 2009 for $2.4B.
- Data Domain Boost. The software that attempts to bridge the gap between Data Domain and data protection software. For more on this, see “Data Domain Boost Software – When Life Hands You Lemons, Sell Lemonade“
- NetWorker. The backup software product that EMC purchased in 2003 (it was called Legato NetWorker.)
- Avamar. The backup software product that EMC purchased when they bought Avamar (the company) in 2006.
- SourceOne. The archiving software product purchased this when they bought Kazeon in 2009.
- Data Protection Advisor. A backup infrastructure analysis program which used to be called WysDM back in 2009.
The pitch that EMC is making, as per Dave Simpson over at 451 group, is that the new licensing will decrease the need for users to size and purchase these products independently and will allow users to more cost-effectively switch out one product for another.
Holy freaking cow.
The reason that the concept of Unified Data Protection™ is so important is that you reduce TCO. A minor way to do that is to reduce your licensing costs – that’s the focus of what EMC has announced here. But that’s a small part of TCO – the tip of the iceberg. Most of your costs with respect to TCO have to do with having to learn, integrate, monitor, manage, maintain different products. EMC has thrown a mishmash of acquired software products together on a price list and are pitching these to buyers – all the while fervently hoping that no one will notice the “moose on the table” – the fact that this does almost nothing to reduce TCO and thus allow customers to be more efficient.
Marketing. Or to put more plainly – you can’t make this stuff up.
