ANTenna Blog -- Storage

The $360 million deal fills a gap in Hewlett-Packard's iSCSI storage and virtualization offerings, and is largely seen as a response to Dell's purchase of EqualLogic earlier this year.

According to HP's press release, "LeftHand Networks delivers scalable storage software on industry-standard hardware that supports existing technology environments. LeftHand Networks’ portfolio extends HP virtualization solutions to the midmarket with software that runs on both existing storage and industry-standard server hardware."

Antone Gonsalves at InformationWeek adds that "LeftHand provides software for aggregating direct attached storage into a shared SAN. In addition, its SAN/iQ software can play nicely with virtual servers, because the product can be packaged with a virtual machine and used as a virtual storage appliance. Overall, LeftHand software offers storage, backup, and disaster recovery.

The idea is that with LeftHand's midrange iSCSI offerings HP can meet the needs of low-end customers with the HP StorageWorks All-in-One Storage System (AiO) and HP StorageWorks Modular Smart Array (MSA) product lines. Larger customers can go for the HP StorageWorks Enterprise Virtual Array (EVA) line.

Since LeftHand was already an HP OEM partner, the deal shouldn't bring huge changes to small and midsize customers. The products already worked together, but now you'll be able to buy them all directly from HP.