The Demise of the NearStore VTL: A historical perspective

Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010

Rumors have been circulating for months about the demise of NetApp's VTL offering. Today, Beth Pariseau from SearchDataBackup published the first public confirmation that development on the product has ceased. It is not a surprise, but makes for an interesting case study. NetApp acquired VTL technology with their purchase of Alacritus for ...

NetApp and Quantum: Why an acquisition would be difficult

Tuesday, July 21st, 2009

A couple of weeks ago, Robin Harris at Storagemojo blogged that he thought it would be a smart move for NetApp to acquire Quantum. I do not agree and think that a Quantum (QTM) and NetApp combination would create major competitive and business challenges and would not be successful in ...

It’s final – EMC acquires Data Domain

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

Just a quick post to highlight Data Domain's announcement that they have agreed to be acquired by EMC.  As mentioned in previous posts (see related posts below), NetApp did not have the financial strength to compete with EMC. The companies that have lost the most in this deal are Quantum and ...

EMC one-ups NetApp

Tuesday, July 7th, 2009

As expected, EMC has increased their bid for Data Domain and is now offering $33.50 per share in cash. Data Domain has been ignoring EMC in favor of their preferred suitor, NetApp; however, with the recent increase, Data Domain has no choice but to consider the EMC offer. This situation ...

Poll: Who will acquire Data Domain?

Monday, June 29th, 2009

Things have been quiet on the EMC/NetAppData Domain for the last couple of weeks.  DDUP's stock price remains above NetApp's current purchase offer ($30) which suggests that people think the bids will increase.  I also found some seemingly contradictory articles.  The Motley Fool suggests that EMC should back out of ...

NetApp and Data Domain: ‘Til death or a better offer from EMC do we part

Wednesday, June 17th, 2009

I recently blogged with my thoughts about EMC acquiring Data Domain, and wanted follow-up with a post discussing some key points about a NetApp/Data Domain merger. Since that last post there have been numerous changes including EMC suggesting that they might up their offer; the inevitable threat of a ...

NetApp is backed into a corner

Friday, June 12th, 2009

Reuters indicates that EMC will up its bid for Data Domain to as much as $35 per share. As previously posted, Data Domain’s products will fit easily into EMC’s product line replacing EMC’s current Quantum-based appliances. With this increased offer, EMC is increasing the pressure on NetApp and ...

EMC and Data Domain: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

Tuesday, June 9th, 2009

I was surprised when NetApp offered $1.5B for Data Domain and was even more surprised when EMC countered with an all cash offer of $1.8B. NetApp has since upped their offer to $1.9B of cash and stock. It is in the context of this uncertainty that I wanted ...

NetApp and EMC Duel to the Death for Data Domain

Thursday, June 4th, 2009

NetApp’s initial bid for Data Domain came as a surprise to many. EMC’s counter was even more of a shock. These discussions have very important implications for data protection and deduplication. Two thoughts immediately come to mind: It’s hard to do deduplication well. EMC and NetApp say that they ...

NetApp Dedupe: The Worst of Inline and Post-process Deduplication

Thursday, October 30th, 2008

NetApp finally entered the world of deduplication in data protection. While they have supported a flavor of the technology in their filers since May 2007, they have never launched the technology for their VTL. Why? Because their VTL does not use any of the core filer IP. ...